
Class ' ^'^ "^-^13 
Book_ 



• A G 



DH. JOHNSON: 



HIS RELIGIOUS LIFE 

AND 

HIS DEATH. 



" As for Johnson, I have always considered him to be, by nature, one of our great 
English souls. A strong and noble man ; so much left undeveloped in him to the 
last. * * * Johnson v?as a prophet to his people — preached a gospel to them — as aU 
like him always do 1" — Carlyle on Heroes, Hero-Worship. 



NEW YORK: 
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 

82 CLIFF STREET. 

18 50. 



Au 






X ; \ 1 1 1 o 1 



PREFACE TO THE READER. 



"When Doctor Johnson died, it was said of him 
by one who had been intimately acquainted with 
him nearly thirty years, " He has made a chasm, 
which not only nothing can fill up, but which noth- 
ing has a tendency to fill up. Johnson is dead. 
Let us go to the next best : there is nobody : no 
man can be said to put you in mind of Johnson." 
And does not this observation hold on to the present 
day ? We have had a Southey, a pure writer, and 
most noble genius, a man too of independence and 
struggling in life, but not a Johnson. 

Dr. Johnson had his defamers, the open ones and 
mean ones. One of these latter ceased not to snarl 
after the great man's death, and to the face of this 
one did the Rev. Dr. Parr boldly say, " Ay, now 
that the old lion is dead, every ass thinks he may 
kick at him." But the longer the lion dead, so 
much the larger has that lion become. And where 
shall we now find the ass ? 



iv PREFACE TO THE READER. 

Politically speaking, it must be expected that 
there should be many who will not agree with Dr. 
Johnson. But these hold him dear in memory. 
Leigh Hunt, in one of his interesting and enter- 
taining works, ^ when excusing Johnson's pompous 
manner, says : " At all events, one is willing to 
think the best of what was accompanied by so much 
excellence. Affectation it was not ; for nobody 
despised pretension of any kind more than he did. 
Johnson was a sort of born bishop in his way, with 
high judgments and cathedral notions lording it in 
his mind, and ex cathedra he accordingly spoke." 
This "born bishop" is a felicitous term. "He ad- 
vanced," says Leigh Hunt again, " by the power of 
his conversation, the strictness of his veracity, and 
the respect he exacted toward his presence, what 
may be called the personal dignity of literature. 
The consequence has been not exactly what he ex- 
pected, but certainly what the great interests of 
knowledge require, and Johnson has assisted men 
with whom he little thought of co-operating, in stat- 
ing the claims of Truth and Beneficence above all 
others .'" These latter words may be claimed as 
the text of some discourse in this book. 

Dr. Johnson truly had no affectation ; no sham 
eccentricities about him. He was one of Carlyle's 
" noble silent men, scattered here and there : silently 

* "The Town," by Leigh Hunt : 2 vols. Smith and Elder. 



PREFACE TO THE READER. v 

thinking ; silently working ; whom no morning news- 
paper makes mention of." Yes, Johnson with all 
his conversation, was not of the noisy inanity of the 
world ; no words of little meaning, no actions of little 
worth were found in him. " Old Samuel Johnson," 
exclaims Carlyle,^ "the greatest soul in England 
in his day, was not ambitious. ' Corsica Boswell ' 
flaunted at public shows with printed ribbons round 
his hat ; but the great Old Samuel staid at home. 
The world-wide soul wrapt up in its thoughts, in its 
sorrows — what could paradings and ribbons in the 
hat do for it ?" Let us not, however, decry Bos- 
well, for his very failings have been of valuable serv- 
ice to men who have the greatest relish for litera- 
ture. He esteemed Johnson, and Johnson esteemed 
him; and that should be enough for us: whether it 
be true or not that Dr. Johnson said to Mr. Long, 
" Sir, if I were to lose Boswell, it would be a limb 
amputated." 

Two men of note might be seen contemporaneous- 
ly in the streets of London. There was Wesley, in 
his band and cassock, with his long hair, white and 
bright as silver, his face and manner indicating that 
all his minutes were numbered, and that not one was 
to be lost. Often irascible in temper, his countenance 
was calm ; and he was remarkable for the cleanness 
and neatness of his appearance. And there was 
* " Heroes and Hero Worship :" p. 351. 



vi PREFACE TO THE READER. 

Johnson, issuing forth from the silent retreat of Bolt- 
court, bodily and bulkily, into the human tide of Fleet- 
street : one time swaying against a huge porter, who 
wisely contented himself with gazing in wonderment 
after his rolling antagonist; at another, lifting pol- 
luted misery out of the mire, and from the very jaws 
of starvation and death ; and then seated on his 
throne, the chair of the Literary Club — he, the ath- 
letic and uncouth, in the old brown coat, and shab- 
bier wig. Contrasts, indeed, these men in person, 
and, in great degree, in sentiment : both worthy of 
admiration and love ; but the one of a deeper and 
more enduring fame than the other. 

With Dr. Johnson we have to do : with his relig- 
ious life, and his death. No apology can be due to 
the public for another book on Dr. Johnson ; but every 
indulgence must be asked for the inadequacy of the 
performance. It may yet be improved : some things 
omitted, some things added. In reading the life of 
Johnson, the author could not fail to perceive, in com- 
mon with others, the exquisite vein of religion and its 
humanities that runs through the whole : but then, 
this vein is not as that of marble in the rough rock, 
but is so surrounded on all sides with literary matter 
of the highest interest, that its continuous line, though 
it can not be hid, yet may not have the prominence it 
deserves. To place the religion and beneficence of 
Dr. .Tohnson more by themselves, though mingled, 



PKEFACE TO THE READER. vii 

more or less in all his thoughts and works, and to 
enable others to discern them at a glance, this has 
been the aim, the desire, of the author. 

And what a religious life it was ! What evidence 
do his written Prayers give (from the 18 th of Sep- 
tember, 1738, to the 18th of September, 1781), of 
the devout state of his mind ; and during this time, 
as well as before and afterward, how did his works 
prove the depth, the charity, the sincerity of his re- 
ligion. Mark those prayers in your privacy (for his 
deeds and conversation are more alluded to in this 
book) ; mark the beautiful reverence, perspicuity, and 
simplicity of their language — no flowery expressions, 
or pomp of diction used, such as abound in the 
" Rambler :" every thing proceeds from the heart — 
humble, contrite, penitent, and full of gratitude I 
See in his Meditations his devout spirit kept alive, 
and the image of his Redeemer never out of sight. 
During all this period of life we find his charities (in 
the Scripture sense) in constant, silent vigor : we 
mark his independence of mind, never a beggar, and 
writing bravely to Lord Chesterfield : we acknowl- 
edge his worth, even Mr. Thrale, a man of business 
and immense wealth, selecting him as his executor : 
nothing equivocal in his actions, nothing mean or 
paltry, but intent " aperto vivere voto," without the 
least ostentation of virtue. Not an atom of stoical 
pride, not an atom of selfishness or self-righteousness 



viii PREFACE TO THE READER. 

in his composition. The incorrupta fides without the 
boasted mens conscia recti assumed by your heathen 
philosophers and moralists. Such was Dr. Johnson 
in life, and in him the union of high intellectual fac- 
ulties with a firm belief in Christianity has conferred, 
under the Divine blessing, a signal benefit on man- 
kind : and while he loved and venerated the Church 
of England, it was in St. Cyprian's sense of the 
universal Church, who wrote, "neither can any man 
be united to the Church, who is separated from the 
Gospel." ^ 

And Dr. Johnson, after many avowed fears, was 
calm and resigned in his death. To have a fear of 
death is natural in man, as the great portrayer of 
human nature saith, f 

" The weariest and most loathed worldly life, 
That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment 
Can lay on nature, is a paradise 
To what we fear of death." 

But still this natural propensity can be overcome, 
and the influence of those invisible realities which 
create and sustain all Christian rectitude, will enable 
one, who is blessed by that Comforter which is prom- 
ised to be with the Church alway, to exclaim in hum- 
blest dependence upon Christ, "O death, where is thy 

* See Bishop Jewell's " Apology of the Church of England." p. 
143, edit. 1685. 

t " Measure for Measure :" Act iii. Sc. ] . 



PREFACE TO THE READER. ix 

sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" The fear 
of God, and not of man, seems ever to have been be- 
fore the eyes of Dr. Johnson, accompanied by a deep 
sense of his own utter unworthiness to obtain salva- 
tion, save through the merits of our blessed Saviour ; 
and it appears to have been the effect of deeply relig- 
ious feeling, that made him averse even to speak on 
the subject of death. To some other men another 
manner is allowed. But to personal fear he was 
always an entire stranger ; and the aged hero, ever 
intrepid amid all his infirmities, when informed by his 
physician that he could not recover, " Then," said 
he, "I will take no more physic, not even my opiates ; 
for I have prayed that I may render up my soul to 
God unclouded." Undauntedly did he meet death ; 
prepared in body and soul for its approach. Reader, 
it is well that it should be thus with any man ! 
Amen. 

A* 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

Page 

Dr. Johnson — his Literary and Religious Life 13 

CHAPTER II. 
His Early Religious Life 19 

CHAPTER III. 
His Religion 30 

CHAPTER IV. 
His Religion 36 

CHAPTER V. 
His Humanity 45 

CHAPTER VI. 
Continued Instances 63 

CHAPTER VII. 
FuETHER Instances 74 

CHAPTER VIII. 
His Chubchmanship 85 

CHAPTER IX. 
His Churchmanship 109 

CHAPTER X. 
His Churchmanship 122 

CHAPTER XI. 
His Churchmanship 1 42 



xii CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XII. 

Page 

His Churchmanshif 176 

CHAPTER Xm. 
Lord Chancellor Tuitrlow 213 

CHAPTER XIV. 
Opinions on Dissent and Dissenters 221 

CHAPTER XV. 
More Opinions on and Treatment of Dissenters 243 

CHAPTER XVI. 
The Wesleyan Methodists 255 

CHAPTER XVH. 
Roman Catholics 272 

CHAPTER XVHI. 
Monastic Life 294 

CHAPTER XIX 
His Superstition 315 

CHAPTER XX. 
Epitaphs 333 

CHAPTER XXI. 
Close of Dr. Johnson's Life — the Fear of Death 348 

CHAPTER XXII. 
Close of Dr. Johnson's Life — His Calmness in Death 366 

CHAPTER XXIII. 
Conclusion 385 



"^4 



DR. JOHNSON. 

HIS LITERARY AND RELIGIOUS LIFE. 



CHAPTER I. 



" We continued our reading of Johnson's Lives of the Poets. How 
often at midnight, as he listened with avidity, he apologized to me for 
keeping me from my rest ! but, still delighted with our reading, he 
would say, ' Well, you may go on a little more.' " — Trotter's Memoirs 
of Fox. 

The same warm spirit of approval with which Charles 
James Fox,* in his last illness, stamped the literary talent 
of Johnson, has animated a very recent writer to speak of 
his kindly affections. " There was in Dr. Johnson," says the 
Rev. James S. M. Anderson, f " an earnest and practical 
benevolence, which no man has surpassed." It shall be a 
main purpose of these pages to verify this saying from evi- 
dence ; for herem we view one of the fairest fruits of religion. 
Little or no allusion shall be made to his political sympa- 

* Though Fox was shy of speaking much in the presence of Johnson, 
and Johnson avoided converse with him and others, thinking at one 
time that he almost deserved hanging for his political opinions, yet we 
find Boswell asking Johnson whether it was true that he had said 
lately, " I am for the king against Fox : but I am for Fox against 
Pitt." Johnson : — " Yes, sir : the king is my master : but I do not 
know Pitt : and Fox is my friend." Johnson added, that Fox was a 
most extraordinary man ; while we are told that Fox " plainly showed 
much partiality for Johnson." Fox was a member of, and sometimes 
presided at the Literary Club ; but Boswell records little of the con- 
versations that took place. 

f In an admirable Lecture on Dr. Johnson, in " Addresses on Mis- 
cellaneous Subjects," by the Rev. J. S. M. Anderson, Chaplain in 
Ordinary to the Queen, &c. Rivingtons. 1849. 



14 DR. JOHNSON: 

thies- or prejudices ; for, while Johnson was a Tory, his 
contemporary Addison was a Whig ; and may we not, in 
great measure, regret that such men should ever become 
involved in the troubling speculations of politics ? Edmund 
Burke and George Canning I you would have gone down to 
posterity with fuller and nobler remembrance, had you more 
loved the leisure for that intellectual toil which leads to pro- 
founder and more lasting achievement in the universal fields 
of literature and science. 

Croker observes, that the very name of Johnson's biogra- 
pher is likely to be " as far spread and as lasting as the 
English language ;" what then must be the knowledge of 
mankind concerning Johnson himself, who, in that very lan- 
guage which is so probably destined to become one of the 
most extended on the earth, has written such lessons of 
wisdom, spoken aphorisms worthy the noblest ages of phi- 
losophy, and delivered, in common conversation, moral and 
religious principles, which can never be out of human remem- 
brance until an absolute empire of Antichrist overspreads 
the world ? For, although the name of Bos well will be 
transmitted to all future time, yet, " You have made them 
all talk Johnson," was the remark made to him ; and his 
own observation was becoming, " Yes, I may add, I have 
Johnsonized the land ; and I trust they will not only talk, 
but think Johnson!'" Largeness of mind, and liberality 
of heart, will inevitably be the lot of all those who have 
power granted them to think as Johnson thought. 

It was well said by a Scotchman,* " When you see him 
first, you are struck with awful reverence ; then you admire 
him ; and then you love him cordially." It may be doubted 
whether many have got beyond the bounds of reverence and 
admiration : it is on closest acquaintance that you learn to 
love him. " To enjoy Dr. Johnson perfectly," wrote Hannah 
More, "one must have him to one's self;" and thus, when 
we can no longer see him bodily present, we must view 
him, not so much in the enjoyment of his " clubbable" dis- 
position, or in the more magnificent walks of literature, or 
in the presence of kings, and lords, and hosts of friends ; but 
* Donald Macleod, a Highland chief. 



HIS LITERARY AND RELIGIOUS LIFE. 15 

in the unobtrusive deed of charity, in letters of consolation to 
the afflicted, in counsel given to the friendless, substantial 
help to the struggling, hospitality to the obscure, and in his 
own thoughts when almost alone. Mr. Steevens makes this 
honorable mention of him, and he knew his private life 
well : " Could the many bounties he studiously concealed, 
the many acts of humanity he performed in private, be dis- 
played with equal circumstantiality, his defects would be so 
far lost in the blaze of his virtues, that the latter only would 
be regarded." We must always suppose that a large amount 
of the beneficence of charitable individuals is hidden from 
public notice. 

The world at the present time, equally as in Johnson's 
own days, may too much regard him as the giant in litera- 
ture, just as we gaze in wonder and awe on the huge mount- 
ain in the landscape, or on the robust and rugged oak that 
mocks with its stalwart form the tenderer trees that bend in 
more beauty around ; and very probably, in like manner as 
the sight of the vaster works of nature appall and pain the 
mind accustomed to the smoother scenes of creation, and as 
the elegant flower enraptures us more than the gnarled and 
proud hero of the forest, so there are those who would rather 
like to gaze on our human leviathan at a distance : rather 
listen to his wise and ponderous thoughts in the more familiar 
form of anecdote ; or rather forsake him entirely for the more 
brilliant and evanescent sayings of inferior men. All these, 
however, look upon him with mental awe — they know there 
is an Alp in the realms of literature as well as of nature ; 
but they as readily decline an acquaintance with the one, as 
they would rather put off to a never-arriving season their 
journey to the other. And this same idea probably pervades 
them in regard to the religion, equally as to the literature 
of the man ; all is so vast, so solemn, so bluntly sincere, 
sometimes telling more of severity than sweetness, savoring 
of any apostolic mind, rather than that of the beloved disciple 
who leaned on the heavenly bosom : there is such knowledge 
of the human heart in its worth and in its pretensions, and 
such bold, outspoken opinion, that they feel afraid to approach 
too nearly to one who may frown on their deficiencies, rather 



IG DR. JOHNSON: 

than encourage, with serener brow and smoother tongue, 
their unduly accelerated advances ; although they well know 
that, in reality, no instance of true humility or merit would 
ever escape his earnest and faithful regard. We may not 
wish these to " talk Johnson" unless they can be brought to 
" think Johnson ;" nor may we care to see the whole world, 
so long as the pure pattern of an Addison exists, thoroughly 
Johnsonized ; yet we may say, that in few ages of the world 
is a goodly leaven of the great and honest heart of Johnson 
more needed than in the present time, when mankind are in 
danger of heeding the allurements of frivolous and brilliant 
entertainment in preference to sound and rightly severe instruc- 
tion, and when mere sensual cant, in literary or religious garb, 
takes the place of the sublime and the sincere. 

This observation, be it remembered, is to be only partially 
applied. We must not decry the present age which, per- 
haps, in a general point of view, is the best to live in of 
any period that has passed in the world. Johnson would 
not dispraise his own times. When Lord Monboddo said 
that our ancestors were better than we, " No, no, my lord," 
exclaimed Johnson, " we are as strong as they, and a great 
deal wiser." In talking of writers and preachers, he said, 
now "every body composes pretty well: there are no such 
inharmonious periods as there were a hundred a years ago ;" 
and he only found fault, wrongly, as we may now think, 
with the innovation that put a stop to the processions accom- 
panying a criminal to Tyburn. And although he writes, 
"The mental disease of the present generation is impatience 
of study, contempt of the great masters of ancient wisdom, 
and a disposition to rely wholly upon unassisted genius and 
natural sagacity ;"* and declared that " if no use is made of 
the labors of past ages, the world must remain always in the 
infancy of knowledge ;" yet he said, " I am always angry 
when I hear ancient times praised at the expense of modern 
times. There is now a great deal more learning in the world 
than there was formerly ; for it is universally diffused. You 
have, perhaps, no man who knows so much Greek and Latin 
as Bentley : no man who knows so much mathematics as 
* Rambler, No. 154. See also No. 50. • 



HIS LITERARY AND ilELIGIUUS LIFE. 17 

Newton : but you have many more men who know Greek 
and Latin, and who know mathematics." How still more 
strikingly true is this of our own times ! Boswell says that 
Johnson was never querulous, never prone to inveigh against 
the present times, as is so common when superficial minds 
are on the fret. Yet if personal superiority over our fellows 
might give us right to talk of the mediocrity of the age, he 
fully possessed that right, both as regards intellect and moral 
disposition. In him the light of genius, united with the light 
of religion, is shown to be capable of producing a pure and 
steady splendor, far surpassing the bright flashes occasionally 
emitted by the glare of genius when combined with impuri- 
ties of heart, and followed generally by flickering and eccen- 
tric motions. A modern anecdote may serve to illustrate my 
meaning. Sergeant Lens having opened a difficult case in a 
most temperate and lucid manner before Judge Dallas, Dal- 
las, at the conclusion of the opening, sent on a strip of paper 
the two following lines to him : 

" Lens, like an argand lamp, shines clear and bright, 
Consumes the smoke, and gives us only light." 

Sometimes Johnson loved argument merely for the sake 
of testing the ground on which others gave out their sen- 
tences : and then often the outburst of his mind, like Foote's 
conversation, resembled a great furnace, whose heat was so 
intense, that it obliged you to stand at a distance from it^ 
" When I was a boy," he said, " I used always to choose the 
wrong side of a debate, because most ingenious things, that 
is, most new things, could be said upon it :" but we under- 
stand the object of his sometimes, when a man, following this 
rule. He felt this to be also an inducement to others ; for 
of skeptics, and false reasoners, he remarked, " Truth will 
not afford sufficient food for their vanity, so they have betaken 
themselves to error." All objections to, as well as proof for, 
any important matter, were reflected on in his mind, and 
thus he writes, " Every thing which Hume has advanced 
against Christianity had passed through my mind long before 
he wrote." 

Small actions mark his sagacity in supposing where mean- 
ness might be found, and show his contempt of it Thus he 



18 DR. JOHNSON'S LITERARY AND RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

bought his little parcels of tea and sugar " at a stately shop," 
because it would not be worth their while to take a petty 
advantage : yet he was not allured by appearances and titles, 
for, having observed the paltry vanity of many people in 
quoting the authority of dukes and lords, as having been in 
their company, he said, he went to the other extreme, and 
would not mention his authority when he should have done 
it, had it not been that of a duke or a lord. 

" Nor wealth nor titles make Aspasia's bliss."* 

Another kind of nobility he best recognized. The name 
of a person having been mentioned to him, he said, "Let me 
hear no more of him. That is the fellow who made the in- 
dex to my Ramblers, and set down the name of Milton thus 
— Milton, Mr. John." And though ignorance more than 
insult perjjetrated this mistake, yet Johnson's lines will oc- 
cur to us as further proof of his feeling — 

" Fate never wounds more deep the generous heart, 
Than when a blockhead's insult points the dart." 
He could not bear pretension or presumption in any man. 
He was told of an impudent fellow who afiected to rail at all 
established systems : " There is nothing surprising in this," 
calmly observed Johnson, " he wants to make himself con- 
spicuous- He would tumble in a pig-sty so long as you 
looked at him and called to him to come out. But let him 
alone, never mind him, and he'll soon give it over." 

This is prudent advice, and came worthily from him, who 
" in all things and every where, spoke out in plain English, 
from a soul wherein Jesuitism could find no harbor, and with 
the front and tone not of a diplomatist but of a man."t 
There were no jewels of paste about his head ; he wore no 
borrowed crown : his was gold without glitter, and he enjoy- 
ed a kinghood of his own. Moreover, we shall find, as we 
proceed, that " few men on record have had a more merciful, 
tenderly afiectionate nature than old Samuer't — ay, when 
young or when older, when poor or when richer, when learn- 
ing or when learned : he was always the same, loving and 
beloved. 

* Irene. t Carlyle's Miscellanies, iv. 96. \ Ibid. 103. 



CHAPTER II. 
EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

Dr. Johnson seems to have been blessed with, strong im- 
pressions of religion at a very early time of life : and these 
impressions certainly biased the tone of his religious feeling 
— one of fear rather than of love — during the periods of 
manhood and old age. He himself said, that he remembered 
distinctly having had the first notice of heaven, "a place to 
which good people went," and hell, " a place to which bad 
people went," communicated to him by his mother, when a 
little child, in bed with her. When he was as yet in petti- 
coats, she put the Book of Common Prayer into his hands, 
and he learned the collect for the day with wonderful quick- 
ness. But she did not always train his young mind with 
judicious care. " Sunday," he says, " was a heavy day to 
me when I was a boy. My mother confined me on that 
day, and made me read the ' Whole Duty of Man,' from a 
great part of which I could derive no satisfaction ;" and he 
gives an instance in proof of this feeling. Soon he fell into 
an indifference about religion — talked flippantly about it — 
found great reluctance to enter a church — and not until he 
resided in college at Oxford, and took up " Law's Serious 
Call to a Holy Life," did he recover from this supineness in 
the most important business of life. How often do we find 
our joyous Christian Sunday invested with notions of gloom, 
through false and injudicious teaching, even in the minds of 
adult scholars, and its present use, as well as its type of the 
future, entirely perverted I In after life, we find him hold- 
ing rational and benevolent ideas respecting the proper observ- 
ance of the Christian Sabbath. 

Here we may be permitted to observe the usefulness of 
parental education. How many children, before escaping 
from the nursery, have learned lessons of virtue from a 



20 DR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

mother or a father,* that have never been forgotten — never 
been driven out of the mind and heart by the largest additions 
of subsequent knowledge ! Of all maternal patterns, the 
mother of St. Augustine ranks the first. From parental 
instruction, such minds as those of Wotton, Hooker, Her- 
bert, Sanderson, &c., &c., derived inestimable benefit. The 
mother of Adam Clarke, like Johnson's mother, was a 
stern, yet useful instructor in the ways of religion : for with 
what horror young Adam heard the croak of the raven after 
she had referred him, on some case of disobedience, to that 
verse of Scripture, which told him that the ravens would 
pick out the eyes of the mocking child I (Prov. xxx. 17) ; 
and, he says, " my mother's reproofs and terrors never left 
me." It was the mother of Byron who led him among the 
grander scenes of nature, and formed within him that gifted 
portion of his mind which imagined noble poetry. And thus 
inanimate things affect us also. The " church bells of our 
home," the " fragrance of our old, paternal fields," dwell in 
our remembrance ; and influence us to good, to the latest 
hour of our lives. f A case to the contrary, such as Words- 
worth's " Michael," may occur ; but who is there that can 
say that his earliest lessons have not continued to be the best, 
and most freshly remembered, during the hours of reflection 
and repose ? Things that we reason upon are not those 
which have greatest hold upon our actions ; the simple offices 
of veneration, obedience, and thankfulness, are those that 
form the happy and dutiful life. 

Dr. Johnson ever thought tenderly of his mother. "You 
frighted me," he writes to Miss Porter, "with your black 
wafers, for I had forgot you were in mourning, and was 
afraid your letter had brought me ill news of my mother, 
whose death is one of the feio calamities on which I think 

* The Rev. Richard Cecil writes : " I was much indebted to my 
Mother for her truly wise and judicious conduct toward me, when I 
first turned from my vanity and sin." And of his other parent : " In 
all my companions — no Father ! In all my conversations, none like 
him ! In all my doubts — no oracle like him ! In all my fears and 
anxieties — no refuge like his generosity ! I feel his loss, though sur- 
rounded with the prodigality of liberality and kindness." 

t Hugh James Rose. 



DE. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 21 

with terror." His letters to hi§ beloved mother, just pre- 
vious to her decease, are the most affecting-specimens of filial 
love that could possibly be written : and his thankfulness to 
all those who waited on her is expressed in the most touch- 
ing terms of gratitude and regard. After her decease, we 
may be sure that his thoughts were identical with those ad- 
dressed some years previously to his friend (Mr. Elphinston) 
on the loss of a mother, where he says, " I can not forbear 
to mention, that neither reason nor revelation denies you to 
hope that you may increase her happiness by obeying her 
precepts ; and that she may, in her present state, look with 
pleasure upon every act of virtue to which her instructions 
or example have contributed." He holds this to be a pleas- 
ing, though not important opinion, to those who are acting 
under the immediate eye of God, which, of course, is the 
supreme idea that should influence our conduct : and who 
can tell in what degree this hope of maternal cognizance may 
not have guided her son, not only in that great work (his 
Dictionary) of which it is recorded, " that he has quoted no 
author whose writings had a tendency to hurt sound relig- 
ion and morality," but also in his numerous other writ- 
ings wherein the talent displayed is not their chiefest excel- 
lence. 

Well is it when we have rehgious parents, and are enabled 
to obey them : but not less blessed is he who can conduct 
himself without frowardness to the less virtuous. That is a 
beautiful passage in one of the letters of Pliny the younger, 
wherein he speaks of Pompeius Quinctianus in these admi- 
rable terms : " How open was his countenance — how modest 
his conversation — how equally did he temper gravity with 
gayety — how fond was he of learning — how judicious his 
sentiments — liow dutiful to a father of a very different 
character — and how happily did he reconcile filial piety to 
mflexible virtue ; continuing a good son, without forfeiting 
the title of a good man I" Who can peruse this remarkable 
instance of heathen virtue, and not, in many situations of the 
moral and religious life, exercise the duties of forbearance and 
benevolence ? 

For such considerate humanity is required by Christianity. 



22 DB. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

"Always in command of himself," it is said of the Christian,* 
" in order to preserve his heart pure and without reproach, 
he feels no hatred toward sinners : he regards them as suffer- 
ing patients, whose body oppresses and governs the soul : he 
considers them as insane mortals, whose erring minds suggest 
to them a false good as their aim, or select a false means 
for attaining a praiseworthy and useful object. Instead of 
hating, he pities them ; and he labors to enlighten them in 

diminishing the evils of error and ignorance He desires 

to effect good, but not with the view of a recompense ; for 
if he desired and demanded any reward, his virtue would no 
longer remain virtue, but would be transformed into selfish- 
ness and mercenary calculation. He loves virtue, because it 
is divine ; he aspires to perfection, because his Heavenly 
Father is perfect." 

For a season, in early youth, Dr. Johnson seems to have 
declined in religion ; and this declension continued until his 
mind was impressed by reading " Law's Serious Call to a 
Holy Life," at Oxford ; which book he took up, expecting to 
find it dull, after the manner of many religious books, and 
perhaps to laugh at it. " But," he says, " I found Law 
quite an overmatch for me : and this was the first occasion 
of my thinking in earnest of religion, after I became capable 
of rational inquiry." The amiable Bishop Sandford has said, 
that no one aids the devil's cause more than he who preaches 
a dull sermon ; and surely a dull book on religious matters 
is an equal evil. Law's book, though far from being light 
or entertaining, is written in an interesting manner, for there 
are certain characters described, and many of his sayings and 
comparisons are of great force, and such as are likely to strike 
the attention, and leave an impression. From his exhorta- 
tions to charity and benevolence, we may well conjecture 
that Dr. Johnson drew many a lesson which we find reduced 
to practice throughout his life.f 

* Hours of Meditation. By Heinrich Zschokke, p. 83. The object 
of this author, as he states in his preface, is, " to propagate true Chris- 
tianity by reanimating the zeal for internal and domestic devotion.'''' 

t The Rev. Dr. Maxwell tells us, that Dr. Johnson " much com- 
mended ' Law's Serious Call,' which, he said, was the finest piece of 



DR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 23 

During even a portion of his career at Oxford, that place 
so awful in religious aspect and solemnity, and the college 
discipline of which he afterward highly extolled, he appears 
not to have been sufficiently under the mild restraint of re- 
ligion, for we are told that he was often seen lounging at 
the college gate, keeping others from their studies, if not in- 
citing them to rebellion against the collegiate authorities. 
And when Dr. Adams, the Principal of Pembroke College, 
told Boswell, what a happy fellow Johnson was when there, 
and how loved and caressed by all : "Oh, sir," replied Dr. 
Johnson, on being told this, " I was mad and violent. It 
was bitterness, which they mistook for frolic. I was miser- 
ably poor, and I thought to fight my way by my literature 
and my wit ; so I disregarded all power and all authority." 
In the year previous to his death (1783), in a conversation 
with Mr. Seward, he says, "I myself was for some years 
totally regardless of religion. It had dropped out of my 
mind. It was at an early part of my life. Sickness brought 
it back, and I hope I have never lost it since." Brought it 
hack ; that is, a thing was recovered which for a time had 
been lost. The principles of religion instilled by his mother, 
at an early age, were revived ; for he adds, " A man who 
has never had religion before, no more grows religious when 
he is sick, than a man who has never learned figures can 
count when he has need of calculation." That there is gen- 
eral truth in this observation, any clergyman, accustomed to 
parochial visiting, will readily perceive. We speak of a man's 
being brought to the knowledge of religion by sudden afflic- 
tion or accident, when we should rather say, that the recol- 
lection of it is renewed in his mind. The religion is there, as 
far as knowledge is concerned, but it is dormant ; and, in 
reality, the particular illness or affliction only stirs it up, and 
calls out more efiectively, that which has been long, and 
perhaps gradually more and more, almost unawares, received 

hortatory theology in any language." This book is published by the 
" Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge," and enjoys a most ex- 
tensive circulation. In the chapters on Humility and Universal Love, 
with its general encouragement of Devoutness of Mind, we can see 
much that would attract the attention of Dr. Johnson. 



24 DH. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

into the heart. Thus, in nine cases out of ten, a man in 
calamity knows well on whom to call, he knows where par- 
don is to be found, he knows Who is the way, the truth, and 
the life ; and he quickly shows that he has not lived in a 
Christian land in vain, not come to God's church in vain, 
not discoursed with Christain people in vain ; but that there 
is religious knowledge within him, which only requires some 
earnest impulse to summon it forth into the light of day. 
The beautiful and breathing statue is in the rugged rock , 
it only requires the hand of the sculptor to remove the 
surrounding rubbish, and expose it to the delighted eye of man. 

That Johnson should have become an inciter to rebellion 
at Oxford, and taken pleasure " in vexing the tutors and 
fellows," is the more remarkable, because he was usually 
obedient to parental authority. He has mentioned, that he 
could not in general accuse himself of undutifulness to his 
parents. " Once, indeed," he said, " I was disobedient : I 
refused to attend my father to Uttoxeter market. Pride was 
the source of that refusal, and the remembrance of it was 
painful. A few years ago (but a few before his death), I 
desired to atone for this fault. I went to Uttoxeter in very 
bad weather, and stood for a considerable time bareheaded 
in the rain, on the spot where my father's stall used to stand. 
In contrition I stood, and hope the penance was expiatory." 
Whatever we may think of this mode of punishment, a mode 
recommended by the law of the land more than by rehgion, 
we still find him mindful of former remissness, and doubtless, 
had any person been living to whom he owed a debt of duty, 
or from whom he should have sought forgiveness, that living 
person would have received satisfaction from him in a manner 
at once faultless and sincere. 

During the college period of his life, we may assert that 
his religious views were substantially reformed. And at this 
time also his thirst for literature was great, and the energy 
of his mind, in its struggles with poverty and hereditary 
disease, most remarkable. The story of the shoes may be 
passed by, as not thoroughly authenticated ;* but the vehement 

* Carlyle seems to credit this story ; and if it be true, how worthy 
his comment ! " One remembers always," he says, " that story of 



DR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 25 

yearning of his soul, incompatible with the poorness of his 
purse, may be gathered from the following soliloquy he was 
heard to utter in his strong, emphatic voice : " Well, I have 
a mind to see what is done in other places of learning. I'll 
go and visit the universities abroad. I'll go to France and 
Italy. I'll go to Padua. And I'll mind my business. For 
an Athenian blockhead is the worst of all blockheads." 
With a desire to visit all universities, when he could 
scarcely maintain a residence in one, he must, like Goldsmith, 
have set out to traverse the continent without a shilling. 
His father was soon in a state of insolvency, and he himself, 
in fact, was compelled to leave Oxford without a degree, ere 
long to become an usher in a provincial school, and next to 
be the subject of the following laudable advertisement : "At 
Edial, near Lichfield, in Staffordshire, young gentlemen are 
boarded and taught the Latin and Greek languages, by 
Samuel Johnson" — an advertisement which secured one ac- 
complished and faithful friend, David Garrick, but which, 
as Boswell observes, had it "appeared after the publication of 
his London, or his Rambler, or his Dictionary, how would it 
have burst upon the world ! " As it v/as, we must look upon 
" the largest soul in all England, and provision made for it 
of fourpence halfpenny a-day."* 



the shoes at Oxford : the rough, seamy-faced, raw-boned college servi- 
tor, stalking about in winter season, with his shoes worn out : how the 
charitable Gentleman Commoner secretly places a new pair at his door; 
and the raw-boned servitor, lifting them, looking at them near, with 
his dim eyes, with what thoughts — pitches them out of the window ! 
Wet feet, mud, frost, hunger, or what you will ; but not beggary : we 
can not stand beggary : Rude, stubborn self-help here : a whole mass 
of squalor, rudeness, confused misery and want, yet of nobleness and 
manfulness withal. It is a type of the man's life, this pitching away 
of the shoes. An original man ; not a second-hand, borrowing or beg- 
ging man. Let us stand on our own basis at any rate ! On such shoes as 
we ourselves can get. On frost and mud, if you will, but honestly on 
that." (Heroes and Hero- Worship, 2d Edit. p. 28.) When Thomson, 
the poet, was robbed in the streets of London of his "magazine of cre- 
dentials" to persons of consequence, as the prime note of his poverty, 
Johnson remarks; "His first want was a pair of shoes." — Life of 
Thomson, in Lives of the Poets. 
* Carlyle. 

B 



26 UR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

Henceforward, we never find him swerving from his relig- 
ious principles, beyond an occasional ebullition of temper, or 
the yielding to a stray temptation ; and, as he himself said 
most truly, a fallible being will fail somewhere. Perhaps 
the most trying time to Johnson, as regards the purity of his 
moral conduct, must have been that which passed during his 
first acquaintance with Savage, the poet. Savage was a 
man who had seen much of life in its every degree, and who 
possessed a vigorous mind and captivating power of conversa- 
tion, at the same time that he was notoriously profligate and 
ungrateful, as appears from the Avhole tenor of his life, and 
his peculiar behavior toward Sir Richard Steele, and the 
Earl of Tyrconnel. With this man, Johnson, through ex- 
treme poverty, was compelled to wander whole niglits in the 
street, neither of them being able to pay for a night's lodg- 
ing ; and, at this time, so shabby was Johnson's clothing, 
that he did not choose to appear in public on some occasions.* 
It does not, however, appear, although Boswell suggests sus- 
picion, that he gave way to the licentious temptations of 
Savage ; but, if he did yield for a time, his natural and re- 
ligious rectitude of conduct was soon regained. And who 
does not perceive the power of his religion, which could pre- 
serve him comparatively unscathed amid the scenes presented 
to his view, and which, ere long, rescued him completely from 
liability to fall into any dangers they may have offered; 
while, on the other hand, poor Savage, with great natural 
abilities, void of all religious guidance, never rose superior to 
sensual indulgence, but to the very last continued notorious 
for every depravity and meanness that could characterize the 
vicious career of an evil and ungoverned heart. Dr. Johnson, 
in the greatness of his disposition, and ever mindful of the 
misery of Savage, and the peculiar aggravations that tor- 
mented his very soul, afterward bestowed as much diligence 
in writing his memoir, as in constructing that of more cele- 
brated poets ; and after truly relating the scenes of wretched- 
ness and crime Avith which Savage was conversant, thus 

* It was at the time that he published the Life of Savage, we have 
the story ol' the plate of victuals being sent to him behind the screen, 
on nccouiJt of tbo shabbiness of his dress. See Croker's last edit. p. 49. 



DR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 27 

charitably concludes : " They are no proper judges of his 
conduct, who have slumbered away their time on the down 
of plenty ; nor will any wise man presume to say, ' Had I 
been in Savage's condition, I should have lived or written 
better than Savage ;' " but as a warning to all men of high 
attainments, he reminds such, "Nothing will supply the want 
of prudence ; and that negligence and irregularity, long con- 
tinued, will make knowledge useless, wit ridiculous, and 
genius contemptible." 

Savage was not an infidel, though he lived the life of a 
man careless of futurity, and in one of his last letters makes 
mention of thankfulness to the Almighty. But Johnson was 
a believer, with all the integrity and faithfulness that be- 
comes one ; and, from the influence which Christian precept 
held over his own mind, he could not imagine that goodness 
could really exist but in union with Christian faith. " No 
honest man could be a Deist," he said, "for no man could be 
so after a fair examination of the proofs of Christianity ;" and 
when Hume Avas talked of, he added, that Hume had men- 
tioned to a clergyman, that he had never read the New 
Testament with attention. Hume, with all his sneering and 
sarcastic propensity, was, we may assert, an honest man ; 
and his well-known saying, that if he could believe in Chris- 
tianity, he should stop every man in the street to tell him of 
his danger, goes far to invest him with the character of in- 
tegrity ; and it is a fact that can not be denied, that we do 
find men capable of the purest moral conduct apart from any 
belief in any particular religion. Although man, on the 
whole, is radically wanting in goodness, yet we all enter into 
negotiations with him, as though he were perfectly moral and 
trustworthy, and we are surprised and angered when he prac 
tices fraud or treachery toward us ; and yet, if he were 
wholly given up to the dominion of an evil spirit, what could 
we expect otherwise in all his transactions, when we had no 
evidence of the existence of the renewed heart within him ? 
Still, if a man be utterly irreligious, that is, be an atheist, 
and disbeliever of a future life, there can be no hold on that 
man — ^he can only have the fear of society, as leavened by 
Christianity before his eyes ; when, on the contrary, what a 



23 DR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 

superior motive has he for rectitude of Hfe, who firmly believes 
that God's punishment will reach even where men can not 
detect,*' that every vi^ord and action is noted by an Almighty 
eye at all times and in all places, and that the destiny of 
eternal happiness or wretchedness depends upon the trial af- 
forded to him in this present life. There are cases of hypoc- 
risy among us, but the instances of religious sincerity, and its 
paramount influence over the whole conduct of life, we may 
readily believe to be innumerable. 

In somewhat the same category with Hume, Johnson 
placed Foote, the facetious actor, if "he were really an infidel. 
" If he be an infidel I" he said, in answer to Boswell's ques- 
tion, " he is an infidel, as a dog is an infidel ; that is to say, 
he has never thought upon the subject." With Rousseau's 
character he had no patience ; " Rousseau, sir, is a very bad 
man. I would sooner sign a sentence for his transportation, 
than that of any felon who has gone from the Old Bailey 
these many years." On Voltaire, and on all infidel or im- 
moral writers, he would have passed the same judgment. 

When speaking of infidelity, we usually mean those per- 
sons who disbelieve the evidences of the Christian religion. 
Doubtless, a Deist may be a very goo'd man ;t and such 

* Mallet, who was a great free-thinker, used on all occasions to 
advance his sentiments, until, we are told, the inferior domestics in his 
house became as able disputants as the heads of the family. The 
servant who waited at table being thoroughly convinced that for any of 
his misdeeds he should have no account to render hereafter, was resolved 
to profit by the doctrine, and made off with the plate, and many things 
of value. He was overtaken, and brought before his master and some 
select friends. At first, the man was sullen, and would answer no 
questions put to him ; but, being urged to give a reason for his infa- 
mous behavior, he resolutely said, " Sir, I have heard you so often talk 
of the impossibility of a future state, and that after death there was no 
reward for virtue, or punishment for vice, that I was tempted to commit 
the robbery." "Well, but you rascal," replied Mallet, "had you no 
fear of the gallows ?" " Sir," said the fellow, looking sternly at his 
master, " what is that to you, if I had a mind to venture that ! You 
had removed my greatest terrors ; why should I fear the lesser ?" — 
Memoirs of Garrick, vol. ii. p. 60. 

t Because a Deist may be a good man, let it not be thought that 
any encouragement is held out to a profession of deism. There is a 
wide difference between the case of a heathen who has never heard of 
Christ, and a man in a Christian country who willfully rejects cvideiicos 



DR. JOHNSON'S EARLY RELIGIOUS LIFE. 29 

were some of the philosophers of ancient times, and such 
were many of the Jews, who could not discern the person or 
times of the CHPasx in the book that guided their moral and 
humane life. But whether an utter infidel can exist, one 
who beholds all the orderly arrangement of the celestial and 
terrestrial systems, and yet can discern no power more than 
human, is a problem indeed. Hannah More makes mention 
of the only atheist (poor Ayrey) she ever knew. " He was 
an honest, good-natured man (this supports our theory), which 
certainly," she observes, " he should not have been on his 
principles." Yet he was not without a belief " He was a 
fatalist, and if he snuffed the candle, or stirred the fire, or 
took snuff^ he solemnly protested he was compelled to do it." 
What made him believe in this necessity of things ? must be 
our question. She adds, " He always confessed he was a 
coward, and had a natural fear of pain and death, though he 
knew he should be as if he never had been." This was, in- 
deed, in him, cowardly and irrational, and quite opposed in 
principle to the fear of death which a Christian may enter- 
tain ; and which Dr. Johnson, himself, did with reason hold. 
However, all was well with Johnson at the last. " God's 
purpose shall stand," said the devout Charles Simeon ; " but 
our liability to fall and perish is precisely the same as ever it 
was : our security, as far as it relates to him, consists in 
faith, and as far as it relates to ourselves, it consists in /ear." * 
Johnson and Simeon were diverse in character, but in this 
feeling they agreed. 

internal and external, the disbelief of which is sometimes attributable 
(like Blanco White's) to defective mental constitution, but in the vast 
majority of cases to vitiated moral feeling, and a dislike of the hum- 
bling doctrines of the Cross. An article in No. CLXXXII. of the 
Edinburgh Review, entitled " Reason and Faith : their Claims and 
Conflicts," may be perused with much advantage by the Skeptic or 
Rationalist. 

* Memoirs of Rev. Charles Simeon, p. 395. 3d edition. 



CHAPTER III. 

HIS RELIGION. 

After this negative proof of Johnson's religion, let us 
turn with more pleasure to the positive. " Christianity," 
he wrote, " is the highest perfection of humanity ; and as no 
man is good, but as he wishes the good of others, no man 
can be good in the highest degree, who wishes not to others 
the largest measures of the greatest good I Thus, though 
the Deist may be good, and zealously wish the good of others, 
yet the Christian, who believes himself to be in possession of 
the greatest good, should be the earnest distributor of it to 
others : in short, how can a man be good, who keeps back 
from other men that which he feels to be the highest perfec- 
tion of humanity ?" This sentiment, which had peculiar 
reference to the translation of the Bible into the Gaelic lan- 
guage, we may well suppose capable of an universal applica- 
tion, and hence it binds every believer in Christianity to the 
duty of propagating, at home aiid abroad, the doctrines and 
tenets of that most holy religion. And before a man can effect- 
ually do this, he must himself be well versed in the doctrine, 
and exercised in the practice of religion ; and, perhaps, few 
men could render a better answer for the faith that is in them 
than Dr. Johnson. He, like Addison, had examined the 
matter deeply, and made up his mind with resolution ; and 
Addison tells us, that when once we have canvassed a subject 
in all it bearings, and come to a jnst conclusion, let not ob- 
jections afterward drive us from that conclusion, but let us, 
if we have not our arguments ready to our mind at the time, 
recur to that period when we did prove all things, and re- 
solved to hold fast that which we then, after our best en- 
deavor, accounted to be the truth. When Johnson was told 
that Goldsmith (and where is an instance of a man's conduct 
being in greater contrast with his writings, the one so c.ire- 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 31 

less, the other so careful?) had said — "As I take my shoes 
from the shoemaker, and my coat from the tailor, so I take 
my religion from the priest ;" he answered, " Sir, he knows 
nothing, he has made up his mind about nothing." Johnson 
was the last man, notwithstanding his reverence for the cler- 
ical character, and for the teaching of the church, to take 
his religion from the priest : no, his great mind must invest- 
igate the matter, he must be convinced of the truth of 
Christianity, and then he would bow his head, with feelings 
of awe and satisfaction, before the Christian instructor, who, 
in accordance with Goldsmith's admiration in a more delibe- 
rate season, would not seek to maintain his sway 

"By doctrines fashion'd to the varying hour." 

That his faith and practice were, in all essential respects, 
thoroughly Christian, it may seem impertinent to prove before 
the minds of those who are well acquainted with the opin- 
ions and character of Dr. Johnson ; but alas, some there are 
who, through ignorance, are ready to depreciate both the tenets 
and the motives of the man, and to look upon him, as others 
have imagined him to be in literature and in society, as a 
sort of bear and bigot, whose failings were so great, that his 
virtues need not be regarded. This is the fanaticism of in- 
considerate and ignorant persons ; and little do men consider 
the hurt that they cause to religion, when they would repre- 
sent Shakspeare as an unbeliever, or Johnson as not strictly 
Chi'istian ; that is, not orthodox according to their self-as- 
sumed notions of orthodoxy. The old hackney-coachmen of 
London were exposed to a penalty for not having a check- 
string, but no law, until some time after, was made to oblige 
them to take hold of such check-string. Alas I in weightier 
matters we have check-strings provided, but we act as the 
hackney-coachmen. 

And what was his pi'ofession in the article of faith ? He 
firmly believed that the death of Jesus Christ was a sacrifice 
for the sins of mankind. At one time, Boswell writes,* " I 
spoke to him of the satisfaction of Christ. He said his no- 
tion was, that it did not atone for the sins of the world : but, 

* In the Touv to the Hel)riile8. 



33 DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 

by satisfying the divine justice, by showing that no less than 
the Son of God suffered for sin, it showed to men the hein- 
ousness of it, and therefore rendered it unnecessary for divine 
vengeance to be exercised against sinners," &c. There seems 
to be some confusion or contradiction here, for surely, if divine 
vengeance be satisfied, and God be reconciled to man by the 
death of Christ, then is that death a satisfaction and atone- 
ment for sin. Again, Boswell writes : " I said, the great 
article of Christianity is the revelation of immortality. John- 
son admitted it was." Here we must remark that Boswell 
describes himself as sounding Johnson upon particular subjects 
but he gives us not Johnson's answers in Johnson's own words 
Therefore Croker, the indefatigable editor of the Life of John 
son warns us, not to trust too much to Boswell's colloquial 
phrases on such vital points, which appear to be sanctioned 
by the admission of Johnson ; and Boswell himself says on 
the former opinion quoted above, " What Dr. Johnson now 
delivered was but a temporary opinion, for he afterward 
was fully convinced of the propitiatory sacrifice, as I shall 
show at large in my future work." And in his future work 
(the life of Johnson) we find Dr. Johnson deliberately stating 
his opinions on original sin, and on the atonement. Let 
these short extracts suffice, for nothing is given contradictory 
to them. " The great sacrifice for the sins of mankind was 
offered at the death of the Messiah, who is called in Scrip- 
ture ' the lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the 
world.'" Again he says — "The peculiar doctrine of Chris- 
tianity is that of an universal sacrifice and perpetual propi- 
tiation. Other prophets only proclaimed the will and the 
threatenings of God : Christ satisfied his justice." In one 
of his last prayers, he beseeches the Almighty — " Make the 
death of thy Son Jesus effectual to my redemption ;" and 
in other prayers he alludes to the satisfaction of Christ's 
death. It is true, that Christ brought life and immortality 
to light through the gospel (2 Tim. i. 10) ; that is, has 
made perfectly certain what was before doubtful to the 
heathen, and not clear to the Israelites, although a few such 
as Job and Cicero, might have held a firm persuasion of a 
future life ; yet this is not the leading idea of Christianity, 
but rather the great fact revealed by the gospel is the Atone- 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 33 

MENT,*' this the grand gospel tidings which should be preach- 
ed without reserve to all people. Whosoever believcth that 
Jesus is the Christ is born of God ; this was the article of 
belief" ofiered to the Jew — namely, to believe that Jesus 
whom the apostles preached was really the Anointed One of 
God, was truly the antitype of the prophecies and sacrifices; 
that the high-priest entered the holy of holies once a year 
with blood as a type of the atonement ; and that now "we 
have a great High-Priest, that is passed into the heavens, 
Jesus the Son of God." (Hebrews iv. 14.) The man who 
held this behef was born of God, for from God only did 
these prophecies, and the ordinance of sacrifices, come : and 
he who had the vail removed from his eyes, so as to discern 
the great secondary intent of these institutions, to him the 
truth was made known by God that J esus was the Christ — 
" whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation :" " the 
PROPITIATION /ar our sins." (Rom. iii. 25. 1 John ii. 2.) 

Seeing that Dr. Johnson so fully believed in the doctrine 
of the Atonement, we may pass over his orthodox belief in 
the Trinity, and in the renewal of the heart of man by the 
Holy Spirit — doctrines which his meditations and prayers 
show to have been held by him — and proceed to the practi- 
cal behavior of his Christian life. And first, we should, in 
estimating the sincerity of a man's religious profession, ask, 
What is the business he pursues, and how does he conduct 
himself in his common dealings with his fellow-men ? Let 
a man be a rich banker or merchant, or be a plowman or 
shoe-black, the question is of vital importance, for the honesty 
and fidelity inculcated by our religion should pervade and guide 
every action and word of our daily negotiations with our fel- 

* Some divines would feel inclined to consider the Incarnation as 
the leading idea of Christianity — for this is " the mystery of godliness." 
It is difficult to give prominence to any chief doctrine, all and each are 
so important, so interwoven. The Atonement is the doctrine we 
most immediately cling to, for the blood of Jesus Christ deanscth us 
from all sin ; yet it is hardly more prominent than the Resurrection 
OR Intercession, except as preliminary and prerequisite; in short it 
is tlie foundation, but not the whole building. For instruction on 
the first-mentioned doctrine, I would refer my readers to the work ol 
the Rev Henry Wilberforce, M. A., entitled, The Doctrine of the In- 
carnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. Murray. 



34 DR. JOHNSOiN'S RELIGION. 

low-creatures. Better is it to have little profession and great 
performance ; as the son who told his father that he would 
not go and labor in the field, and yet went, was better than 
he who said he would go, and went not : thus in vain do 
richer men attend at church or tabernacle, speak in the 
cause of religion and inscribe their names on subscription 
lists, unless in the ordinary duties of life they hate to defraud 
the fatherless, the widow, or any man, woman, or child 
whatever. Vain is the talking of plowman or artisan, if 
wdien the master's eye is not on them they turn to idleness, 
or squander time or money which should be devoted to the 
support of their families, and to the aid of virtuous princi- 
ples. Now with Dr. Johnson literature was a business, and 
in its pursuit he could accumulate or reject what Scripture 
calls " good works," for a man is to be judged according to 
the deeds done in the body, and the deeds thus done are most 
manifold in the daily occupation of man, whatever it may 
be. It is very pleasing, then, to observe, that in Dr. John- 
son's business of life he was often holy, and always singularly 
harmless and undefiled. Of the literature with which he 
has for ever enriched the British store, where can the single 
page be pointed out that would tend in the slightest degree 
to allure the mind from religion ? On the contrary, how 
many of his writings are replete with religious counsel, de- 
livered in a tone of exhortatioa as earnest as it is argument 
ative I To mention but a few, let us read in the " Ram 
bier," of which Boswell says, " In no writings whatever can 
be found more bark and steel for the miiicl,'" No. 7, on the 
Love of Retirement; 17, on the Frequent Contemplation 
of Death ; 50, on a Virtuous Old Age ; 54, a Deathbed, 
&c. ; 110, on Repentance ; 155, 175, and 185 : and in the 
"Idler," Nos. 4, 14, 41 (this letter should be read with 54 
in the " Rambler" as an antidote to its gloom), 43, 51, 52, 
58, 89, and 96 — what a warning in this last for the youth 
of our land I let us attentively read these papers, and we 
can not fail to imbibe feelings of moral fortitude, patience, 
self-denial, and preparation for the immortal life. And yet 
to writings more decidedly religious than these we can point, 
even to his Prayers and Meditations, and to Sermons which 
bear ample internal evidence of having issued from his pen. 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 35 

Even his Dictionary was conceived under the restraint and 
guidance of rehgion : and we may suppose that most of his 
Uterary labors, hke that of the " E-ambler," were consecrated 
by concise and hearty prayer ; and of most of them he could 
assert, as he said of the " Lives of the Poets," " Written in 
such a manner as may tend to the promotion of piety." No 
man more abhorred those whose literary exertions were spent 
in pandering to the vicious inclinations of the age, and in 
putting' bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter ; and he gives 
this wholesome monition : " Vice, for vice is necessary to be 
shown, should always disgust : nor should the graces of gayety 
or the dignity of courage be so united with it, as to reconcile 
it to the mind."* Againf he speaks of those licentious 
writers who have not only forsaken the paths of virtue, but 
attempted to lure others after them : " They have smoothed 
the road of perdition, covered with flowers the thorns of 
guilt, and taught temptation sweeter notes, softer blan- 
dishments and stronger allurements :" and he concludes, 
" But, surely, none can think without horror on that man's 
condition, who has been more wicked in proportion as he had 
more means of excelling in virtue, and used the light im- 
parted from heaven only to embellish folly, and shed lustre 
upon crimes." Well would it be, if the writers of this nine- 
teenth century of Christianity, those who "sot fashion on 
the side of wickedness," who recommend every evil action 
by associating it with qualities that serve to engage the 
afiections and attract the mind, and who are unsettling the 
better sentiments of thousands upon thousands of the middle 
and poorer classes of society, and luring them into irrecover- 
able unhappiness — well would it be if these would take such 
sentences of the wise, and great, and enduring heroes of lite- 
rature seriously to heart, and henceforth seek only to advance 
the moral welfare of the masses of society, whose approba- 
tion of virtue receives strength and vigor " from the books 
they read, the conversation they hear, the current application 
of epithets, the general turn of language," ^ &c., and toward 
whom any labors adverse to morality, and henoe to happi- 
ness and tranquillity of mind, are positive oruelty. 
* Rambler, No. 4. t Ibid. No. 77. t Paley on the Moral Sense 



CHAPTER IV. 

HIS RELIGION. 

Dr. Johnson's habit of devout prayer must have exer- 
cised a most beneficial influence, not only on his literary 
efforts, but also on the whole tenor of his life ; indeed, but 
for the energy of his religious devotion and practice, his very 
existence would, perhaps, have been wrecked on the gloomy 
element of his natural constitution. Every good gift corneth 
from God, must be sought of God ; and we are graciously 
assured that, from the humble prayer of the meek and rever- 
ent petitioner, the Almighty will not turn away. On every 
new undertaking, on receiving the Sacrament and hearing 
of sermons, on parting with friends, and in all assaults of 
temptation or approaches of affliction, we find him using and 
recommending the blessing of prayer. When he accompanied 
Boswell to Harwich, on the journey of the latter to Holland, 
" We went and looked at the church," is Boswell's record ; 
" and having gone into it, and walked up to the altar, John- 
son, whose piety was constant and fervent, sent me to my 
knees, saying, " Now that you are going to leave your native 
country, recommend yourself to the protection of your Crea- 
tor and Redeemer. :' " and with what a sterling letter was 
this advice followed up, wherein he writes, " You will, per- 
haps, wish to ask, what study I would recommend. I shall 
not speak of theology, because it ought not to be considered 
as a question, whether you shall endeavor to know the will 
of God."* But more striking are his short memorandums 
of prayer with his poor black servant. "Sunday, 17th. 
Prayed with Francis, ivhich I flow do commonly, and ex- 
plained to him the Lord's Prayer." His letters to this ser- 
vant, whom he always addressed as " Dear Barber," (and in 
his address to no male being did Johnson exceed this epithet), 
* See Croker'.s latest edition, p. 162. 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 37 

are characteristic of the affectioTUtteness of his nature, as 
well as of its humility ; for, as the Persian peasant, who, 
when elevated from his hovel to the palace of his sovereign, 
kept with care his original wooden shoes, so was Johnson 
ever mindful of his first humble station, and never domi- 
neered over the poorest or most unfortunate. This is one of his 
letters to Francis Barber, whom at the age of twenty-five 
years he had put to school ; and the whole of it must be 
given to show the tender courtesy, as well as feeling of aflec- 
tion, mingled with due caution for him, in which he addressed 
his poor negro ; in, fact, he could not have treated a lord 
with more respectful regard : 

" Dear Francis — I am at last sat down to write to you, 
and should very much blame myself for having neglected you 
so long, if I did not impute that, and many other failings, to 
want of health. I hope not to be so long silent again. I 
am very well satisfied with your progress, if you can really 
perform the exercises which you are set ; and I hope Mr. 
Ellis does not suffer you to impose on him, or on yourself 
Make my compliments to Mr. Ellis, and to Mrs. Clapp, and 
Mr. Smith. 

" Let me know what English books you read for your 
entertainment. You can never be wise unless you love 
reading. Do not imagine that I shall forget or forsake you ; 
for if, when I examine you, I find that you have not lost 
your time, you shall want no encouragement from yours, 
aiiectionately, 

" Sam. Johnson." 

We find that Johnson never would allow of swearing, or 
profane expressions, in his presence. This was agreeable to 
the profound sensations of awe with which he ever contem- 
plated the Supreme Being, and which have been remarked 
in the distinguished Robert Boyle, and other men of great 
talent and genius. On one occasion Boswell repeated to 
him a smart epigrammatic song of his own composition, 
which had been set to music by Mr. Dibdin, on the procura- 
tion of Garrick ; but, because the words, "Oh, by my 



33 DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 

soul I"* occurred in it, Johnson said, " It is very well, sir, 
but you should not swear." Upon which Boswell wisely 
altered those words to " Alas, alas!" Sir John Hawkins in- 
forms us, that when a person of some celebrity was using 
many oaths in his conversation, Johnson said : " Sir, all this 
swearing will do nothing for our story , I beg you will not 
swear." The narrator continued to swear ; Johnson said, 
" I must again entreat you not to swear." He swore again : 
Johnson quitted the room. On another occasion, at Dr. 
Taylor's, at Ashbourne, he was very angry with a gentleman 
farmer who swore in his discourse, and reprimanded him in 
the way best adapted to silence a vulgar man. Davies, who 
wrote the Life of Garrick, reminded him of Mr. Murphy, a 
celebrated actor, having paid him the highest compliment 
that ever M'as paid to a layman, by asking his pardoii for 
repeating some oaths in the course of telling a story. -Bos- 
well was once suggesting, that probably more gentleness of 
manner might have added benefit to his conversations ; " No, 
sir," said Dr. Johnson, " I have done more good as T am. 
Obscenity and impiety have always been repressed in my 
company I" Boswell added, with characteristic withdrawal 
of an opinion, "True, sir; and that is more than can be 
said of every bishop. Greater liberties have been taken in 
the presence of a bishop, though a very good man, from his 
being milder, and, therefore, not commanding such awe." 
There was an authority about Dr. Johnson's speech, and a 
readiness always to extinguish a flippant or impertinent 
speaker, that must often have stopped the utterance of a 
sentence, and consigned many a conception to prudent silence. 
We are told also, that he disapproved of introducing Scrip- 
ture phrases into secular discourse. BosAvell thinks this a 
question of some difficulty ; and that, on some occasions, a 
scriptural expression, like a highly classical phrase, may be 

* An excellent little book on the Ten Commandments, by the Van. 
Archdeacon Vickers (Rivingtons), may be consulted on this matter. 
Speaking of the Third Commandment, he says, " It forbids the sin of 
common cursing and swearing : and this, whether the sacred name of 
the Lord God himself is made use of, or any other set of words ; as, 
'By my life,' 'Upon my soul,' or any such expressions." See pages 
47 and 49. 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 39 

used to advantage. May we not ask, whether much will 
not depend on the company, and on the nature of the con- 
versation, in which it is used ? Generally speaking-, it would 
be improper, and, as regards any witty or light allusion, 
utterly reprehensible. The Scriptures are from heaven ; 
their pages are those of holy inspiration ; and the AVord of 
God, as the name of God, should only be uttered by mortal 
man -with the feelings and in the tone of sacred reverence. 
They are different from the ivories of God, which we treat 
of in common parlance, inasmuch as every thing around and 
about us is His work ; and not to speak commonly of these, 
would be not to speak at all. 

In the " Microcosm," a well-known Etonian publication, 
issued when Canning was an Eton boy, there is an article 
written by Canning himself, in which, as Hannah More 
observes, the practice of common swearing " is treated with 
a vein of ridicule, not unworthy of Addison in his happiest 
mood." She is surprised to find such " elegant ridicule, and 
well-supported ironical pleasantry" in a youth, but she 
evidently knew not who the youth was ; and herein we have 
a striking instance of "the boy the father of the man." 
But amid all Canning's pleasant ridicule, undertaken on the 
principle, 

" Ridiculura acri 
Fortius ac melius magnas plerumque secat res," 

this more serious reflection occurs :* "It has been observed," 
he writes, " by some ancient philosopher, or poet, or moralist, 
(no matter which), that nothing could be more pernicious to 
mankind than the fulfilling of their own icishes. And, in 
truth, I am inclined to be of this opinion ; for many a friend 
of mine, many a fellow-citizen of this lesser world, would, had 
his own heedless imprecations on himself taken effect, long 
ere this have groaned under the complication of almost every 
calamity capable of entering a human imagination. And 
with regard to the world at large, were this to be the case, I 
doubt whether there would be at the present time a leg, or 
limb of any kind, whole in his Majesty's service." He then 
goes on to tell us of a lieutenant who still continued to 
* Vol. i. No. 11, p. 14. 



40 DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 

execrate his eyes, although he had lost one of them. The 
worst sin that attaches to swearing is, that we undeservedly 
make the Almighty a wholesale condemner of mankind, 
whenever any displeasure against a fellow-mortal, or ourselves, 
arises in our own minds ; and this, when on every Sabbath- 
day, in the service of the Church of England, we are ex- 
horted to " speak good of His name." We may well 
imagine how repugnant swearing would be, in this light, to 
the ideas Dr. Johnson entertained of the beneficence of the 
Deity. 

Happily the speech of man is altered since Canning's day ; 
and not even troopers now swear without reproach or re- 
buke. It will not be, we may safely prophesy, the universal 
language contemplated by Bishop Wilkins ; neither need 
another Hibernian divine arise to tell us, more jpatricB, that 
«' the little children that could neither speak nor walk, run 
about the streets blaspheming." No, the danger is quite in 
the other extreme. 

And though a distinction should ever be made between 
the comparative demerits of the two extremes — between the 
crime of the blasphemer and the error of him whose reverence 
of G-od's name restrains him from a lawful oath ; yet to this 
latter his error should be pointed out, and he should be told 
that his misconstruction of scriptural texts may be as glaring 
as it is conscientious. Thus it will be better to educate for 
the right, rather than to legislate for the wrong view. If 
leo-islation is to be guided by the private judgment of persons 
on texts of Scripture, the question may well be asked, Where 
shall we stop ? It is well known that a sect has arisen 
which refused to participate in any kind of labor, because 
our Lord said, Labor not for the meat that perhheth ; and 
others might refuse to enter a court of law at all, because 
St. Paul has said, Now there is utterly a fault among you, 
because ye go to laiv one with another. And yet the words, 
Swear not at all (Matt. v. 34), no more mean that no oath 
is to be taken, than the words, Labor not, mean that no 
labor is to be done. Bishop Sanderson and Archbishop 
Newcome show that the Apostle's words have nothing to do 
with judicial swearing, but are directed solely against rash 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 41 

and angry oaths, which the Jews were in the habit of utter- 
ing in common conversation. And this must be the case, or 
the Apostle Paul would contradict his Lord ; for it is written 
in Hebrews vi. 16, A?i oath for confirmation is to them an 
end of all strife. And St. Paul frequently called God to 
witness the truth of his assertions, as may be seen in 
Pvomans i. 9, and also ix. 1 ; 2 Cor. i. 18 and 23 ; Gal. i. 
20 ; 1 Thess. ii. 5. In Deut. vi. 13, we read, Thou shalt 
fear the Lord thy God, and serve him, and swear by his 
7iame ; and m Heb. vi. 13, St. Paul says, When God 
tnade inomise to Abraham, because he could sivear by no 
greater, he sware by himself Let us say, that oaths should 
be few, and always solemnly administered, or they will not 
be reverenced ; but we have not a tittle of Scripture that 
would serve to warrant their utter abolition. 

Many other points of importance in his religious character 
might be advanced, which show that religion held a para- 
mount and constant sway over that conscience which the 
Almighty has placed in the breast of all men, to be regulated 
and guided by the enlightenment of his holy Word. Thus 
his self-examination was prominent — a duty from which men 
shrink as regards the soul, in the same degree that so many 
are fearful to be informed by the skillful physician of the ex- 
tent of growing disease in the body. We find by many ex- 
pressions in letters, and in conversation, that he often dared 
to look into himself, and retired from the review of life with 
those humbled feelings which must mortify any tendency or 
temptation to self-glorification in any true Christian. How 
careful was he as to forming rash resolutions of conduct, 
knowing the weakness that is in man I How he censured a 
book written by Lord Karnes, in which it was asserted that 
virtue was natural to man ! " After consulting our own 
hearts," he said, " and ivith all the helps lue have, we find 
how few of us are virtuous ;" and he added, that all man- 
kind knew Lord Kames's saying not to be true. Plow he 
lamented that " all serious and religious conversation was 
banished from the society of men ;" how he ever thought that 
we should be " making the concerns of eternity the govern- 
ing principle of our lives ;" and " he reproved me," says the 



42 DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 

Rev. Dr. Maxwell, " for saying grace without mention of 
the name of our Lord Jesus Christ :" a name which Croker 
thinks too awful to be introduced amid the levities of such a 
time ; but, if we may introduce the name of the Creator, 
surely we may that of the Redeemer also. How careful 
was he to avoid ostentation ! and once, when he was asked 
the reason of laying aside a watch which had the words Nv^ 
epxETat engraved on the dial-plate, he said, " It might do 
very well upon a clock which a man keeps i?i his closet ; 
but to have it upon his watch, which he carries about with 
him and which is often looked at by others, might be censur- 
ed as ostentatious." He probably cared not for what others 
thought, but felt conscious in himself that such was ostenta- 
tion, and a snare that might gradually lead to a betrayal of 
humility. And with this feeling he never wished to appear 
singular, but in all common and harmless things to act in 
conformity with the world around him. " No person," he 
said, " goes under-dressed till he thinks Imnself of conse- 
quenee enough to forbear carrying the badge of his rank 
upon his back." How true is this — what pride may lurk 
in the old hat, or ordinary coat — how many persons who 
have become rich, pride themselves on not being fine I In. 
answer to arguments urged by Quakers, &c., he exclaimed, 
" Oh, let us not be found, when our Master calls us, ripping 
the lace off our waistcoats, but the spirit of contention from 
our souls and tongues ! Let us ail conform in outward cus- 
toms, which are of no consequence, to the manners of those 
among whom we live, and despise such 'paltry disti')ictivns. 
Alas !" he continued, " a man who can not get to heaven in 
a green coat, will not find his way thither the sooner in a 
gray one I" This is all good common sense — and those who 
wish to see the matter concerning gay apparel more fully 
discussed will do well to read the conti'oversy between pious 
Hervey and good John Wesley, in which the argument pro 
and con is well nigh exhausted. But in his charities and 
humanities of every kind, we find him seeking to avoid the 
observation, of the world, and literally doing his alms in 
secret. 

No man could be more convinced of the protection of God, 



DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 43 

and the certainty of the future life. To Miss Porter he 
writes : "We have one Protector, who can never be lost but 
by our own fault." Speaking of the difficulty of attaining 
to literary fame : " Ah, sir, that should make a man think 
of securing happiness in another world, which all who try 
sincerely for it may obtain. In comparison of that, how 
little are all other things I" To Bos well he writes, after 
having been at Lichfield, where he witnessed what he calls 
"a collection of misery," one friend lame, another paralytic, 
another blind, and another deaf: " Such is life. Let us try 
to pass it well, whatever it be, for tliere is surely some- 
thing beyond it." To Mrs. Thrale, on the loss of her child, 
how mindful of our frailness, how consoling to the mother I 
" He is gone, and we are going I . . . Remember, first, that 
your child is happy ; and then, that he is safe, not only from 
the ills of this world, but from those more formidable dangers 
tvhich extend their mischief to eternity. You have brought 
into the world a rational being : have seen him happy during 
the little life that has been granted to him ; and can have 
no doubt but that his happiness is now." What mother 
will not, under similar mournful circumstances, feel her sor- 
row chastened by words like these, from such a heart of 
truth ? 

The above instances but show imperfectly the power and 
constancy of Johnson's religion. We must behold it in his 
charity and humanity, the fruits of his faith : we must view 
it as it pervaded his entire life. In every good thing he 
grows better by acquaintance : and though rough at times, 
yet, as Goldsmith said, he had nothing of the bear but the 
skin. When he was told that Sir James Macdonald, who 
had never seen him, had a great respect for him, somewhat 
mingled with terror — " Sir," he said, " if he were to be ac- 
quainted with me, it might lessen both." Wise and great 
as Dr. Johnson was in this world, yet was he humble and 
earnest in his longing after immortality, and could have 
said in the language of one of our best divines,* though not 
the most celebrated, " I have but this one business to do, to 
insure this dear soul of mine in its voyage to eternity : let 
* Lucas. 



iJ DR. JOHNSON'S RELIGION. 

who -will gain the reputation of a wise man by a clearer 
foresight and thriftier management of affairs, by an unwearied 
attendance and insinuating applications, I shall think myself 
wise enough, if I can but be saved, and great enough if I 
enjoy but the smiles of Heaven." 

And pleasing is it to know that this resolution was fol- 
lowed out to the last. We have the testimony of an excel- 
lent individual, to which more may be added in its proper 
place, who writes, " No action of his life became him like 
the leaving of it. His death makes a kind of era in litera- 
ture : piety and goodness will not easily find a more able 
defender ; and it is delightful to see him set, as it were, his 
dying seal to the professions of his life, and the truth of 
Christianity."* 

Gratifying also is it to find that the conduct of Pope in 
the hours of death was such as became the author of the 
ecstatic speech addressed by the Dying Christian to his Soul. 
" Pope," says Dr. Johnson,! " expressed undoubting confi- 
dence of a future state." Being asked by his friend Mr. 
Hookp, a Papist, whether he would not die like his father 
and mother, and whether a priest should not be called, he 
answered, "I do not think it essential, but it will be very 
right : and I thank you for putting me in mind of it." Mr. 
Hooke, on this occasion, told Dr. Warburton, " that the 
priest whom he had provided to do the last office to the 
dying man, came out from him, penetrated to the last degree 
with the state of mind in which he found his penitent, 
resigned and u-rajit up in the love of God and man." 
Rightly, as devoutly, may we here exclaim with the poet, 

" You see the man ; you see his hold on heaven !" 



* Memoirs of Hannah More, vol. i. p. 394. 

t Life of WilUara Bowyer, by John Nicholls, p. 394. 



CHAPTER V. 

HIS HUMANITY. 

We speak of a man's religion, and of his humanity or 
benevolence, when in fact these are inseperable : for, 
although men by nature are enabled to perform offices of 
kindness, yet it is religion that cultivates and increases the 
kindnesses of human nature, and religion without the prac- 
tice of benevolence would be a nonenity. It is so much our 
interest to be kind one to another, that very much of our 
benevolence may be leavened with selfish feelings ; still there 
are innumerable acts of charity which can spring only from 
the energy of faith acting on our hearts — faith in God, and 
Christ, and the Holy Spirit, and a world to come ; not that 
the hope of reward hereafter solely stimulates the mind, for 
this would be looking forward to a larger reward than man 
can give (albeit such a motive is sanctioned in God's word, 
for we are to rejoice and leap for joy, tliat great is our 
reward in heaven),^ but mainly because we know that it is 
pleasing to God that we should relieve the poor, comfort the 
afflicted, speak kindly to and encourage the wretched. The 
mournful, the meek, the merciful, the pure, the peaceable, 
the poor in spirit, are to be the favorites of man, inasmuch 
as they are pronounced to be the favorites of God : and let 
men profess whatever zeal they may in the cause of religion, 
and be ever so orthodox, or ever so warm in peculiar views 
adopted by themselves, the saying holds good that tlie worst 
of all heretics is the loicharitable man. 

Having become acquainted with something of the depth, 
and fervor, and thorough sincerity, of Dr. Johnson's religion, 
we are led to expect many acts of humanity emanating from 
him whom the pious Hannah More describes as one " whose 
faith is strong, whose morals are irreproachable I" Yet, so 
* Luke vi. 23. 



46 DR. JOHNSONS HUMANITY. 

filled is Boswell's Life of him with literary achievement and 
anecdote, so fraught with wise observations on common and 
M^orldly things, that the scarlet thread of his true beneficences 
may, in some degree, escape that notice and regard of the 
hurried reader, to which they are entitled. Still it does 
exist in no mean quantity and quality, proving with what 
trueheartedness he said on one occasion, "Getting money is 
not all a man's business ; to cultivate kindness is a valuable 
part of the business of life." 

At the very outset of this consideration of Dr. Johnson's 
life in its humane aspect, it must be candidly stated that at 
times he was exceedingly rough, and even coarse in his 
manner ; and yet seldom was he so without subsequent re- 
pentance and remorse. That he did good, as much as lay 
in his power, to many persons, is very apparent ; and it will 
not be found that he ever designedly did an injury to any 
one ; so that we may exclaim with Burke, when he spoke in 
reference to the alleged roughness of Johnson's manner, " It 
is well if, when a man comes to die, he has nothing heavier 
upon his conscience than having been a little rough in con- 
versation." 

Great minds have often great failings as well as great vir- 
tues, and although we can not call the occasional roughness 
of Johnson's manner a great failing, yet we can see that the 
ponderous power of his thought, when provoked to vehemence, 
naturally led him to seek at once to annihilate an antagonist, 
especially if he was one in whom presumption or flippancy 
of remark was observable. " How very false is the notion," 
says Boswell, " that has gone the round of the world, of the 
rough, and passionate, and harsh manners of this great and 
good man I" And although Boswell allows that sometimes 
he displayed impetuosity of temper, too easily excited by the 
folly and absurdity of others, and perhaps at times unwar- 
rantably shown, yet he tells us, that during by far the greater 
portion of his time, he was civil, obliging, polite, insomuch 
that many persons who were long acquainted with him,* 

* The ingenious Mr. Mickle thus wrote. of Di'. Johnson, in a letter 
to Boswell : 

" I was upwards of twelve years acquainted with him, \ras frequently 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 47 

never received a harsh word from him, or heard him express 
himself with heat or violence in any way. That he was an 
admirer of gentleness in society may be learned from an an- 
ecdote related of him, to the effect that when Mr. Vesey was 
proposed as a member of the Literary Club, Mr. Burke be- 
gan by saying that he was a man of gentle manners. " Sir," 
said Johnson, "you need say no more. When you have 
said a man of gentle manners, you have said enough." And 
that he had no great faith in the efficacy of severe manners 
in the great object of ameliorating the disposition of mankind, 
may be gathered from his observation on Lord Mansfield's 
saying, " My lords, severity is not the way to govern either 
boys or men." " Nay," remarked Johnson, " it is the way 
to govern them ; I know not whether it be the way to mend 
them." There is a just soundness in this latter remark, 
more than in the former : the one is that of an advocate in 
a particular cause, the other that of a philosopher in the 
calmness of truth. 

We must always bear in mind that Johnson inherited 
a constitutional malady, which at times must needs cre- 
ate morbid and melancholy sensations in his mind, and ren- 
der it impatient under provocation, and especially sensi- 
tive in any case of a worrying or disturbing nature.* We 
know how painfully aware he was of his state, how ha 
prayed and struggled against this calamity, and heroically 

in his company, always talked with ease to him, and can truly say, that 
I never received from him one rough word." 

For some people, however, he had words rough indeed, and many 
of these persons deserved them. 

Hannah More writes (1785) — " Boswell tells me he is printing an- 
ecdotes of Johnson, not his life^ but, as he has the vanity to call it, his 
pyramid. I besought his tenderness for our virtuous and most re- 
vered departed friend, and begged he would mitigate some of his as- 
perities. He said, -roughly, ' He would not cut off his claws, nor make 
a tiger a cat, to please any body.' " — Memoirs of Hannah More, vol. i. 
p. 403. 

* Carlyle says of Dr. Johnson, " Nature, in return for his noble- 
ness, had said to him, Live in an element of diseased sorrow. Naj', 
perhaps the sorrow and the nobleness were intimately, and even in- 
separably, connected with each other." — Heroes and Hero-Worship, 
p. 280. 



48 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

wrote of himself, " Though it is wise to be serious, it is 
useless and foolish, and perhaps sinful, to be gloomy." Who 
that loves the character of Cowper also, will not bewail in 
his very heart the misfortune of this kind that perplexed the 
temperament of that good man ; and of which he speaks so 
strongly and so tenderly, from his first attack of depression 
when commencing studies at the Temple, even to that time 
when he writes, " Thus have I spent twenty years, but 
thus I shall not spend twenty years more I" No, though he 
was " hunted by spiritual hounds in the night season," and 
though he wrote " under the pressure of sadness not to be 
described ;" yet his religion bore him through difficulties and 
distresses which, in its absence, would have overwhelmed 
him. 

How salutary must have been his going to church for 
the first time after his recovery from his first attack, when 
his heart was full of love to all the congregation, especially to 
such as seemed serious and attentive. Fortunate indeed for 
his mental health was his attachment to the church, and his 
friendship with some of her pious ministers. " Cowper," 
says his biographer, " was warmly attached to the religion 
of the Established Church, in which he had been trained up, 
and which, like his friend Mr. Newton, he calmly and delib- 
erately preferred to any other." =* This choice must have 
served rather to cheer his mind than to excite it, and to 
soothe his heart rather than inflame it: for "all those alle- 
viations of sorrow," as Dr. Johnson observes of his case, 
" those delightful anticipations of heavenly rest, those healing 
consolations to a wounded spirit, of which he was permitted 
to taste, at the period when uninterrupted reason resumed its 
sway, were unequivocally to be ascribed to the operation of 
those very principles and views of rehgion," that is, Cal- 
vinistic, as moderated by the tone of the church, which he 
had adopted. Cowper, sitting at the feet of the Rev. John 
Newton, or in familiar counsel with Madan, and Johnson 
kneeling in awe at the altar of St. Clement Danes, were 
both indebted (how largely !) to the healing influences of our 

* Life of William Cowper, by Thomas Taylor, 3d edition, p. 402. 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 49 

most holy and most consoling religion. Of either of them 
we might aptly say, 

" Thou shalt have joy in sadness soon ; 
The pure, cahn hope be thine, 
Which brightens, like the eastern moon, 
As day's wild lights decline." 



INSTANCES OF HIS HUMANITY. 

It now becomes a peculiar jDleasure to record some in- 
stances, scattered throughout his valuable career, of Dr. 
Johnson's kindnesses shown toward his fellow-creatures, in 
order that we may determine whether, in good George Her- 
bert's words, he did 

" Find out men's wants and will, 
And meet them there. All worldly joys go less 
To the one joy of doing kindnesses." 

A characteristic incident is related of him so early as the 
year 1732, before he was twenty-three years of age, and from 
the previous opinion of his friends concerning him, we may 
be sure that it was by no means his first kind action. It 
appears that he engaged to translate a book from the French 
into English, but he soon became indolent, and the work at 
a stand-still. His friend, Mr. Hector, we are told, " knew 
that a motive of humanity would be the most prevailing ar- 
gument with his friend ;" so he forthwith went to Johnson, 
and communicated to him that the printer could have no 
other engagement until this one was finished, and that he 
was very poor, and his family in want. Johnson, upon 
hearing this, in spite of the ailment of his body, immediately 
set vigorously to work. " He lay in bed," we read, " with 
the book, which was a quarto, before him, and dictated, 
while Hector wrote." It must be mentioned, that at this 
time Johnson himself was in a state of great poverty, and he 
obtained only five guineas on the completion of the book. 

There are few men who will not consider the history and 
fate of Collins the poet very affecting ; and affecting also is 

C 



50 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

Johnson's tenderness on his behalf. " Poor dear Collins '" 
he writes, " would a letter give him any pleasure ? I have 
a mind to write I" To another he writes, in less than a 
month's time, " Poor dear Collins ! Let me know whether 
you think it would give him pleasure that I should write to 
him. I have often been near his state, and therefore have 
it in great commiseration." Some months after, he writes 
again, " What becomes of poor dear ColHns ? I wrote him 
a letter which he never answered. I suppose writing is very 
troublesome to him. That man is no common loss I" The 
repetition of the above endearing epithets shows how poor 
Collins's state was fixed in Johnson's mind. He died in the 
course of this year. Collins was evidently a man of most 
refined genius and sensitive temper, but irresolute and indo- 
lent to the last degree ; ever planning, yet never achieving. 
What he did perform, makes us deeply deplore the existence 
of these failings, whereby much of a charming style of pen- 
siveness has been lost to the admirers of that kind of dispo- 
sition. Johnson's account of his life, though brief, is beau- 
tifully written ; and how piercing is the thought, in a letter 
to Joseph Warton, after reflecting on the folly of exulting in 
any intellectual powers, when the condition of poor Collins 
is beheld, " This busy and forcible mind is now under the 
government of those who lately would not have been able to 
comprehend the least and most narrow of its designs I" As 
in his Life of Savage, so in that of Collins, the charitable 
mind of Johnson is ever prominent ; and it was after the 
lapse of many years, that he mentions him as one, " with 
whom I once delighted to converse, and whom I yet remem- 
ber with tenderness." Nearly twenty years after Collins's 
death, we find him commissioning Boswell to purchase for 
him "Collins's Poems," just four years before he commenced 
the " Lives of the Poets," which were completed in the year 
1781 ; so it may be supposed that he wished to have the 
poems for his own satisfaction, independently of any idea of 
writing a memoir of the poet ; especially since he orders 
them with another little book in no kind of connection with 
the English poets. Our living poet, Wordsworth, has not 
been unmindful of the sorrows of a brother poet ; and how 



DK. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 61 

tender is his " Remembrance of Collins," vain though the 
prayer be I 

" Now let us, as we float along, 
For him suspend the dashing oar ; 
And pray that never child of song 
May know that poet's sorrows more." 

Tenderness begets tenderness : we feel kindly disposed 
toward the man whom we know to be kind to others. A 
remarkable instance of this feeling occurs in Johnson's senti- 
ments toward Thomson, the poet. It was expected that he 
would, in his "Lives of the Poets," have treated Thomson's 
priyate conduct with severity. But no ; one letter of the 
poet, one proof of fraternal afiection disarmed him. Great 
credit is due to Boswell, who may have been in part anxious 
to exalt the character of his coitntryman, but quite as great 
credit is due to Dr. Johnson, in so readily casting away a 
prejudice, and allowing one trait of generous and aflectionate 
conduct to blot otit from his biography a multitude of sins. 
Boswell inclosed a copy of Thomson's last letter to his sister, and 
writes to Dr. Johnson, " From this late interview with his sister, 
I think much more favorably of him, as I hope you will." 
Dr. Johnson inserts the letter in his " Life of Thomson," and 
a most tender and generous letter it is — though nothing more 
than what should ever pass between brother and sister. 

Great was Johnson's kindness toward Goldsmith, and 
Goldsmith certainly appreciated it, although each would occa- 
sionally say rather severe things of the other : and it is said 
that Johnson had more kindness for Goldsmith than Gold- 
smith for him. The latter had, unfortunately, a great desire 
to shine in conversation^too often unconscious, dissimilar to 
Addison, of his want of ability in this faculty — and thus not 
only attracted to himself some pertinent saying of Johnson, 
but also endured much self-mortification. Once when he 
thought he was talking much to the admiration of a mixed 
company, a German, who had perceived Dr. Johnson about 
to speak, suddenly touched him, saying, "Stay, stay, Toctor 
Shonson is going to say something :" and a similar circum- 
stance also occurred at a party at Sir Joshua Reynolds's. 
Dr. Johnson said truly of him, " No man was more foohsh 



52 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

when he had not a pen in his hand, or more wise when he 
had :" and on another occasion, " Goldsmith was a man who, 
whatever he wrote, did it better than any other man could 
do." Goldsmith himself sometimes seemed aware of his 
deficiency, although he would always persist in talking on 
matters he knew nothing of whatever ; for Johnson says, 
" What Goldsmith comically says of himself is very true — 
he always gets the better when he argues alone ; meaning, 
that he is master of his subject in his study, and can write 
well upon it ; but, when he comes into company, grows con- 
fused, and unable to talk." It is pleasant, however, after 
all their little bickerings, to know that Johnson had a most 
tender regard for Goldsmith. The kindness of Johnson in 
selling a MS. for him, and thus giving him the means of 
paying his rent, is well known. He spoke well of, and per- 
sonally admired all his written performances, excepting the 
Life of Parnell, which he thought poor because the materials 
were scanty ; and after his death, he speaks of " poor, dear 
Dr. Goldsmith," and writes, "Let not his frailties be remem- 
bered : he was a very great man." And still more pleasing 
is it to find Goldsmith, the vanquished of Johnson, saying, 
" Johnson, to be sure, has a roughness in his manner : but 
no man alive has a more tender heart." Dr. Johnson wrote 
his epitaph in Latin, a circumstance which led to the cele- 
brated round robin : but why does not Goldsmith appear in 
his " Lives of the Poets ?" 

A noble trait in Dr. Johnson's character is that of his 
writing Dedications for the works of others, and even writing 
for another man's support. We have no reason to think 
that he received any compensation for these labors, because, 
on the contrary, some of those authors M'hom he thus bene- 
fited were unwilling to confess that they had been so aided, 
for fear it might be thought that Johnson had also added 
pecuniary assistance. Still they wished, at the time of the 
publication of their books, that the public should believe that 
Johnson wrote such Dedications, and perhaps it was their 
mean wish that the public should think that the writer was 
remunerated by them. We may know that their works sold 
better in consequence of his exertions, for Boswell said to 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 53 

him once, " What an exceeding expense, sir, do you put us 
to in buying books to which you have written prefaces or ded- 
ications I" and Goldsmith having interposed a remark to the 
effect that probably little wit appeared in these prefaces, and 
Johnson having acquiesced, Boswell unnecessarily, and per- 
haps impertinently asks. Why these persons, then, should 
apply to a particular individual ? Johnson, who, of course, 
could not answer that it was on account of the celebrity of 
his own name, or the superiority of his own composition, and 
would have been still more distressed to blazon or magnify 
his feelings of charity, simply replied, " Why, sir, one man 
has greater readiness at doing it than another." We can 
understand that it was his kindness of heart that led him in 
this way to be the coadjutor of a literary brother. 

For some months he wrote articles in a periodical for poor 
Smart, who went out of his mind. But afterward finding 
that Smart was engaged under disadvantageous tei-ms by a 
bookseller, and that in fact he was benefiting the bookseller 
rather than the unfortunate author, he gave it up. " I hoped," 
he said, " his wits would soon return to him : mine returned 
to me, and I wrote in the 'Universal Visitor' no longer." 

Boswell gives a list of the number of dedications and pref- 
aces which he wrote, and Johnson himself said, " Why, I 
have dedicated to the royal family all round ; that is to say, 
to the last generation of the royal family :" and though gen- 
erally insensible to the charm of music, we find him dedica- 
ting some for the German flute to the Duke of York. Though 
he did not feel himself responsible for every word he wrote 
in these prefaces, &c., yet we may be sure that, in the main, 
he wrote with much honesty of purpose, for he always made 
a stipulation that the book should be innocent — and, we find 
him, on an occasion of offering an excuse for certain flattery 
of the queen by Garrick, saying, " Why, sir, I would not ivrite, 
I would not give solemnly under my hand a character beyond 
what I thought really true :" for a speech on the stage was 
merely formal. And we find* that even his usual politeness 
to ladies gave way to his habit of plain speaking ; for when a 
lady once pressed him closely to read over her new play, and he 
* Life of Hannah More, vol. i. p. 201. 



54 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

told her that she might as well read it herself, to which she 
rejoined that she had no time, she had already so many irons in 
the fire : " Why then, madam," said he, quite out of patience, 
for the lady would not take his delay as a hint, "the best thing I 
can advise you to do, is to put your tragedy with your irons." 

Boswell relates the humorous nature of some of the inter- 
views between Johnson and sundry authors, men who in fear 
and trembling awaited his opinion. He remarks, "It is 
wonderful what a number and variety of writers, some of 
them even unknown to him, prevailed on his good-nature to 
look over their works, and suggest corrections and improve- 
ments." But perhaps his good-nature was rarely drawn 
upon in greater degree than by Davies, the bookseller, who, 
in his absence, ventured to publish two volumes of " Fugi- 
tive and Miscellaneous Pieces," as the production of the 
" authors of the Rambler." Johnson, we are told,* was 
inclined to resent this liberty, until he recollected Davies's 
narrow circumstances, when he cordially forgave him, and 
continued his kindness to him as usual. 

Many other persons, besides authors, he assisted with rec- 
ommendatory letters in lieu of dedications ; and this he did 
with exceeding tenderness of manner both toward the per- 
son to whom he recommended, as well as toward the one 
recommended. On introducing a young man, named Pater- 
son, who offered himself to the Academy, to Sir Joshua 
Reynolds, he writes, " How much it is in your power to 
favor or forward a young man, I do not know ; nor do I know 
how much this candidate deserves favor by his personal 
merit, &c. I recommend him as the soti of my frie?id." 
And mindful of the exceeding use even of a great man's 
countenance to a commencing author or artist, yet not wish- 
ing to bind Sir Joshua, he just adds gently, " You have heard 
of a man who asked no other favor of Sir Robert Walpole 
than that he would bow to him at his levee." 

To Mr. Langton, and Dr. Warton, he wrote on behalf of 

a poor and aged painter, " who never rose higher than to get 

his immediate living, and at eighty-three was disabled by a 

slight stroke of the palsy," that they would exert their influ- 

* See Chalmers's Biographical Dictionary, vol. xix. p. 66. 



DR. JOHiNSON'S HUMANITY. ' 55 

ence with the Bishop of Chester to obtain for him the next 
vacancy in a hospital. This was on June 29th, and on the 
following July 9th, he writes to the Kev. Dr. Vyse, request- 
ing his assistance in recommending an old friend to the Arch- 
bishop, as governor of the Charter House. " He has," he 
states, " all the common claims to charity, being old, poor, 
and infirm to a great degree. He has likewise another claim, 
to which no scholar can refuse attention : he is by several 
descents the nejjJiew of Grotius — of him from whom perhaps 
every man of learning has learned something." It appears 
that Archbishop Cornwallis readily complied with Dr. John- 
eon's request ; but, unfortunately, a letter of thanks which he 
wrote to Dr. Vyse, and in which he further praises Grotius, 
has been lost, and Dr. Vyse only forwards a very short letter, 
<'as a proof," he says, " of the very humane part which Dr. 
Johnson took in behalf of a distressed and deserving person." 
He must have written four letters to the Rev. Dr. Vyse, in 
the cause of this poor man.* 

* In the Public Advertiser of May 13, 1778, is this letter, from a 
benevolent man of that time, Ignatius Sancho, and inserted unknown to 
him: 

To Mr. B 

" Dear Sir — I could not see Mr. de Groote till this morning ; — he 
approached the threshold, poor man ! in very visible illness ; yet, un- 
der the pressure of a multitude of infirmities, he could not forget his 
recent humane benefactor. With faltering .speech he inquired much 
who you were ; and in the conclusion, put up his most earnest petitions 
to the Father of mercies in your behalf; which (if the prayers of an 
indigent genius have as much efficacy as those of a fat bishop) I should 
hope and trust you may one day be better for. He is in direct descent 
from the famous Hugo Grotius, by the father's side .... His age is 
eio^hty-six ; he had a paralytic stroke, and has a rupture. His eyes 
are dim, even with the help of spectacles. In truth, he comes close to 
Shakspeare's description, in his last age of man — ' sans teeth, sans 
eyes, sans taste, sans every thing.' 

" He has the honor to be known to Dr. Johnson, and the luck to be 
sometimes i-emembered by Mr. Garrick. If you help him, you do your- 
self a kindness — me a pleasure — and he^ poor soul, a good, which he 
may one day throw in your teeth, in that country where good actions 
are in higher estimation than stars, ribbons, or crowns. 

" Yours most respectfully, Ignatius Sancho. 

" He lodges at No. 9, New Pye-street, Westminster." 

This amiable letter-writer was foolishly given the name of Sancho, 



50 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

Once, on going in a hackney-coach to dine with General 
Paoh, Boswell was surprised at Johnson first stopping at the 
bottom of Hedge-lane, in order to leave a letter, as he told 
him, " with good news for a poor man in distress." The 
poor man's name was Lowe, a painter, who lived at No. 3, 
in Hedge-lane, and was in extreme distress ; and the " good 
news" most probably was that a picture of his had been 
admitted to the Exhibition of the Royal Academy. A few 
years afterward we read a very earnest letter from him to 
Lady Southwell in behalf of this son of poverty ; and to Sir 
Joshua Reynolds, and Barry, he sent letters requesting a re- 
consideration of the merit of a picture painted by Lowe. He 
happily prevailed, and the picture was exhibited at the Royal 
Academy. The subject was the Deluge, when the water 
had nearly reached the summit of the last uncovered mount- 
ain, and one of the antediluvian race is represented as swim- 
ming toward this spot, vdth a child uplifted by his gigantic 
arm, where a lion, lean and hungry, stands ready to seize 
the child. Johnson said, " Sir, your picture is noble and 
probable." " A compliment, indeed," said Mr. Lowe, " from 
a man who can not lie, and can not be mistaken." Poor 
Lowe's gratitude exceeded his judgment of his patron's 
opinion in regard to pictures ; for although the idea is certain- 
ly noble, yet it seems not to have been well executed, and he 
never afterward showed any talent. After this, we find two 
kind letters from Dr. Johnson to the poor painter, and he 
writes for him a letter of thanks to Lady Southwell, which 
he is to copy. Johnson, probably, had not a high idea 
of Lowe's talent, but he was a persevering friend to him. 
In one of his diaries we read this memorandum, " Paid 

L six guineas ;" whjch Croker determines in favor of 

Lowe. 

by a lady to whom he was presented in England, at the age of two 
years, on account of some resemblance to that facetious squire. He 
was a negro, and was baptized by the name of Ignatius, by the bishop 
at Carthagena. He seems to have idolized Sterne, and imitates hira 
in his blanks and dashes — for he possessed some literary ability, though 
rising little above a servant ; and Memoirs of his Life, with his letters 
and portrait, were thought worthy of publication. See Gentleman'' s 
Mngnzinr, p. 4.37. 1782. 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 57 

There was a man named Peyton, who wrote for him 
when dictating for his Dictionary, to whom he was always a 
friend. The dehcacy with which Johnson would send him on 
an errand, thus making him useful without degrading him, 
is specially remarked by Boswell. We read of an entry in 
his diary, "On Good Friday I paid Peyton, without requiring 
work." He also writes letters to Mr. Langton and Mrs. 
Thrale on his behalf. To the former he says, " I put into 
his hands this morning four guineas. If you could collect 
three guineas more, it would clear him from his present diffi- 
culty ;" and to the latter, " Peyton and Macbean are both 
starving, and I can not keep them." At this time Johnson 
had not much to spare, though in enjoyment of his pension ; 
but, even at his poorest times, he would spare something for 
an old friend. Peyton was a man of considerable learning, 
and Dr. Johnson apprized Mrs. Piozzi of his death : " Poor 
Peyton expired this morning ;" he then describes the intens- 
ity of his poverty, and his wife's illness, and would forgive 
him if even the thought of wishing to see his wife removed 
from the miseries and expenses of this painful world entered 
his mind ; and thus concludes, " Such miscarriages, when 
they happen to those on whom many eyes are fixed, fill his- 
tories and tragedies ; and tears have been shed for the suffer- 
ings, and wonder excited by the fortitude, of those who neither 
did nor suffered more than Peyton." This must recall to 
our minds that excellent article of rebuke in the Adventurer, 
in which whole armies are described as perishing in war, 
without drawing forth one sigh from the listening circle ; 
but when a single instance of a dying officer is related, and 
the account of his wife wandering over the field of battle to 
search for him among the slain — then the tears flow fast, and 
that sympathy is aroused for the individual, which was denied 
to thousands. Johnson frequently relieved him, and bore the 
expenses of his burial, and also that of his wife. 

There was a man very meanly dressed whom Dr. Johnson 
used to observe at the celebration of the Holy Communion. 
More than once he wished to speak with him, and on one 
occasion slipped some money into his hand, for he perceived him 
to be in want. " I invited home with me," he says, at last, 

c* 



58 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

" the man whose pious behavior I had for several years ob- 
served on this day, and found him a kind of Methodist, full 
of texts, but ill instructed." He was altogether disappointed 
in him, but adds this amiable reflection : " Let me not be 
prejudiced hereafter against the appearance of piety in mean 
persons, who, with indeterminate notions, and perverse or in- 
.legant conversation, perhaps are doing all they can." 

The following memoranda are found together : " July 2, 
I paid Mr. Simpson ten guineas, which he had formerly lent 
me in my necessity." " July 8, I lent Mr. Simpson ten 
guineas more." There is something very pleasing in the 
relieved thus assisting a generous reliever. "July 16, I 
received seventy-five pounds. Lent Mr. Davies twenty-iive." 

To Mr. HoUyer he writes, " I have lately received a let- 
ter from our cousin Thomas Johnson, complaining of great 
distress. His distress, I suppose, is real. In 1772 (this was 
two years before), about Christmas, I sent him thirty pounds, 
because he thought he could do something in a shop : many 
have lived who began with less. In the summer, 1773, I 
sent him ten pounds more, as I had promised him. What 
was the event? In the spring, 1774, he wrote me, and 
that he was in debt for rent, and in want of clothes." John- 
son expresses surprise at this, since no misfortune or miscon- 
duct is alluded to, and requests Mr. HoUyer to make inquiry. 
The man had visited Johnson in the summer : "I was in 
the country," he says, " which, perhaps, was well for us both. 
I might have used him harshly, and then have repented^ 
It would have been best for the poor man, most probably, if 
Johnson had used him harshly, for repentaiace with Johnson 
was not an empty sorrow. He concludes the letter, " I 
have sent a bill for five pounds, which you will be so kind to 
get discounted for him, and see the money properly applied, 
and give me your advice what can be done." Jolmson 
thought that the consumption of forty pounds in sixteen 
months, and application for a further sum, shoM'ed that some- 
thing must be wrong in the way of self-exertion, and there- 
fore, though he could not refuse his kinsman, yet still he was 
not the man to be imposed upon by an idle or worthless 
person. 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 59 

Mr. Strahan, the printer, had taken a poor boy from the 
country on Johnson's recommendation. Johnson having in- 
quired after him, said, " Mr. Strahan, let me have five guin- 
eas on account, and I'll give this boy one. Nay, if a man 
recommends a boy, and does nothing for him, it is sad work. 
Call him down." Boswell followed Johnson into the court- 
yard behind Mr. Strahan's house, and there, he says, had 
proof of -vfhat Johnson professed, when he had said, " Some 
people tell you that they let themselves down to the capacity 
of their hearers. I never do that. I speak, uniformly, in 
as intelligible a manner as I can." 

"Well, my boy," exclaimed Johnson, "how do you get 
on ?" " Pretty well, sir ; but they are afraid I arn't strong 
enough for some parts of the business." " Why, I shall be 
sorry for it," replied Johnson ; "for when you consider with 
how little mental power and corporeal labor a printer can 
get a guinea a week, it is a very desirable occupation for 
you. Do you hear? take all the pains you can: and if 
this does not do, we must think of some other way of life for 
you. There's a guinea." 

" Here," remarks Boswell, " was one of the many, many 
instances of his active benevolence ;" at the same time he 
could not but smile at the slow and sonorous solemnity with 
which bending down, he addressed a short, thick-legged boy, 
who all the while was exceedingly awed and awkward. Cer- 
tainly " mental power Siwd. corporeal labor" must have alarmed 
the poor boy, in the same degree that a worthy magistrate 
of this nineteenth century once terrified a hapless prisoner. 
The man had been convicted summarily during the absence 
of this magistrate, who, on coming into the justice room, de- 
sired to be informed of the evidence against him, in order 
that he might know that the sentence of imprisonment was 
just. Having found it to be so, he addressed the prisoner, 
and in his usual emphatic tone declared to him, that "he 
richly deserved to be incarcerated. '' The unfortunate man, 
who thought that nothing short of being impaled alive could 
be meant, or some other dreadful species of laceration, was 
glad enough, awe-stricken as he was, to be removed with 
Avhole skin and bones to the county jail. 



CO DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

In the case of a clergyman's daughter, who had been re- 
duced to misery through an unfortunate marriage, he writes 
to the Rev. Dr. Hamilton, "in favor of one who has very 
little ability to speak for herself" He had known her for 
many years, and concludes his letter: "Her case admits of 
little deliberation : she is turned out of her lodging into the 
street. What my condition allows me to do for her, I have 
already done ; and having no friend, she can havfe recourse 
only to the parish." On this, and other notes of a charita- 
ble nature, addressed to this clergyman, to whom he says, 
" You do every thing that is liberal and kind," the son of 
Dr. Hamilton observes, " They are of no farther interest, 
than as showing the goodness of Johnson's heart, and the 
spirit with which he entered into the cause and interests of 
an individual in distress, when he was almost on the bed of 
sickness and death himself" 

It appears from another note at this time, that Johnson 
had, on the application of Miss Reynolds, frequently relieved 
other poor persons than those with whose misery or poverty 
he had himself become acquainted. Neither did loss of 
character altogether prevent the flowing forth of his charity. 
Boswell records : "His generous humanity to the miserable 
was almost beyond example. The following instance is well 
attested : coming home late one night, he found a poor woman 
lying in the street, so much exhausted that she could not 
walk ; he took her upon his back, and carried her to his 
house, where he discovered that she was one of those wretch- 
ed females who had fallen into the lowest state of vice, pov- 
erty and disease. Instead of harshly upbraiding her, he had 
her taken care of with all tenderness for a long time, at a 
considerable expense, till she was restored to health, and en- 
deavored to put her into a virtuous way of living."* This is 

* In the Rambler (No. 107, vol. ii. p. 213) we find these remarks 
from the pen of Dr. Johnson : 

"It can not be doubted but that numbers follow this dreadful course 
of life, with shame, horror, and regret ; but where can they hope for 
refuge ? ' The ivorld is not their friend, nor the xcorldh laic.'' Their 
sighs, and tears, and groans, are criminal in the eyes of their tyrants, 
the bully and the bawd, who fatten on their misery, and threaten them 
with want or a jail if they show the least design of escaping from their 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 61 

as it should be, for the Almighty himself is kind to the un- 
thankful and the evil. The sterner moralist may confine 
himself to too narrow an idea of duty, and so act upon it 
until no room for mercy be left in his mind ; and if mercy 
were shut out, where would any of the human race be ? We 
are all transgressors, but God is kind to us — God is provoked 
every day, but every day He is forgiving us. If the Al- 
mighty preferred a harsh sense of duty and justice rather 
than a loving one of mercy and forgiveness, where should 
we be ? Oh let us ever remember with the moralizing poet, 
that, 

" The right too rigid hardens into wrong !" 

It is when an offense has been committed, when the of- 
fender is before us, and when his transgression and trespass 
have placed him entirely in our power — it is then alone that 
mercy can be shown : and we should be careful how we let 
slip the gracious opportunity afforded to us. Certainly we 
must prefer those who are of the household of faith, and who 
live holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, by the 
grace of God : yet never let us be tempted to cast those of 
another sort quite away. Let us be sure it is the safest and 
noblest part to be helpers of all. Who knows but what our 
temporal kindness may win the heart of a wicked man ; 
and while we "give an alms, we may, in some sense, bestow 
a heaven too?" Our charity must not feed vice, and we 
should take care lest we be imposed on ; but still, we should 
be especially heedful how we become the executioners of dis- 
tress and want upon any man, though he be as evil as he is 
needy : nay, we must positively seek to do him good. " Happy 

bondage; * To wipe all tears from off all faces,' is a task too hard for 
mortals ; but to alleviate misfortunes is often within the most limited 
power : yet the opportunities which every day affords of relieving the 
most wretched of human beings are overlooked and neglected, with equal 
disregard of policy and goodness." 

This paper bears the date of March 26, 1751 ; but it is not possible 
to ascertain the precise period in which this act of humanity occurred. 
It happened during the time of Mrs. Desmoulins's sojourn at his hos- 
pitable house, and probably several years after the article in the Ram- 
bler was written. 



62 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

I," exclaims a sound divine, "if I may so cheaply bestow a 
double life of body and of soul." Alas, and alas ! there is much 
the very reverse of this passing daily and hourly in the world ; 
and too many, if not hardened, yet become tied and bound 
by too strong a chain to their sins. 

The same kind of ill-feeling is apparent, too often, among 
religious disputants — there is no charity bestowed on an an- 
tagonist. Bishop Sanderson has an admirable sermon* on 
the want of charity in Papists and Puritans toward Church- 
of-England-men — " as if," he says of the latter, " all but 
themselves were scarce to be owned either as brethren, or 
professors, or Christians or saints, or godly men ;" all 
which names they appropriate to themselves I 

* Sanderson's Sermons, p. 63, preached in 1633. 



CHAPTER VI. 

CONTINUED INSTANCES. 

In prosecuting the great work of his English Dictionary, 
Dr. Johnson employed six amanuenses, and "to all these 
painful laborers," says Boswell, " he showed a never ceasing 
kindness, so far as they stood in need of it." For Shells, 
who died of a consumption, " he had much tenderness ;" but 
of his kindness to Macbean we have the fullest account. For 
him Johnson wrote a preface to a work on ancient Geography ; 
and very many years afterward obtained admission for him 
as a poor brother into the Charter House, by an application 
to Lord Thurlow ; and here we find him again writing to 
the Rev. Dr. Vyse, as he had before done in the case of 
De Groot, the nephew, or grandson, of Grotius. He states 
that he is one of his old friends, a man of great learning, 
and " being a modest scholar, will escape embarrassment" (in 
attending before the Archbishop), " if you are so kind as to 
introduce him, by which you will do a kindness to a man of 
great merit," &c. Nearly four years after this deed of charity, 
he writes, " A message came to me yesterday to tell me that 
Macbean is dead, after three days of illness. He was one 
of those who, as Swift says, stood as a screen between me 
and death. He has, I hope, made a good exchange. He 
was very pious : he was very innocent : he did no ill : and 
of doing good a continual tenor of distress allowed him few 
opportunities : he was very highly esteemed in the Charter 
House." Macbean was indeed poor, for after being several 
years librarian to the Duke of Argyle, he was left without 
a shilling : it is gratifying to observe that Johnson lost not 
sight of him after he had entered this welcome asylum. 
The screen between me and death must allude to his being 
the oldest surviving friend of Dr. Johnson's — and Johnson died 
in the same year. The death of each friend of our early years 



64 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

must be a memento inori to us, but when it comes to the 
last remaining one, the fact which the warning serves to 
remind us of must be nigh at hand. Would that Johnson 
could have, at this time, spoken in the language of Cicero, 
when, on lamenting the death of Scipio, he found other con- 
solation than in the remembrance of his beloved friend's vir- 
tues ! " Were I totally deprived," he says, "of these sooth- 
ing reflections, viy age, however, tooidd afford me great 
consolation : as I can not, by the common course of nature, 
long be separated from him." 

Johnson's charity commenced with his earliest years of 
manhood and only ceased with his death. Boyse, the poet, one 
of his very early companions, was assisted by him. On one 
occasion Johnson collected a sum to redeem his friend's clothes 
from the hands of the pawnbroker ; and " the sum," said 
Johnson, " was collected by sixpences, at a time when to Tue 
sixpence was a serious consideration." His very last words 
on his death-bed were those of kindness and blessing to one 
of his fellow mortals. 

One of the most extraordinary and continued acts of kind- 
ness in Dr. Johnson's life, was that which opened his house 
as a residence to several persons of indigent circumstances. 
Let us first tell the case of Mrs. Williams. She was the 
daughter of a Welsh physician, and excited the compassion 
of Dr. Johnson, on coming to London to have an operation 
performed on her eyes. He took her into his house for the 
greater convenience in this performance, and, on its failure 
(for she became totally blind), he never desired, so long as 
he was in possession of a house, that she should depart from 
under its roof. Sir John Hawkins, Lady Knight, Miss Haw- 
kins, and Bos well, all speak highly of her talent and pleasing 
conversation ; and so great was her judgment, that the former 
asserts, " Johnson, in many exigencies, found her an able 
counselor, and seldom showed his wisdom more than when 
he hearkened to her advice." In return, however, the knight 
asserts, she received inestimable advantages from her inter- 
course with Johnson. He himself says of her, " Her curiosity 
was universal, her knowledge was very extensive, and she 
sustained forty years of misery with steady fortitude." Han- 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 65 

nah More, iu describing a visit to Dr Johnson's house,* after 
saying, " Can you picture to yourselves the palpitation of our 
hearts as we approached his mansion ?" — observes, " Mrs. 
Williams, the blind poet, who lives with him, was introduced 
to us. She is engaging in her manners, her conversation 
lively and entertaining." With all this praise in her favor, 
we must be sorry to find Chalmers speaking of her temper 
as being " far from pleasant," and of her " fretful and peevish 
manner," under the roof of one by whom she was " protected 
and cheered by every act of kindness and tenderness which 
he could have showed to the nearest relation."! 

She was poor, and mainly supported by the voluntary con- 
tributions of others. Dr. Johnson obtained for her pecuniary 
aid from Mrs. Montague (a lady whom he solicited also on 
behalf' of a Mrs. Ogle, Davies, a bankrupt bookseller, &c.); 
from Garrick also he asked a benefit-night at the theatre, 
and was eager in disposing of the tickets — (from this she de- 
rived X200); and he greatly assisted her in some literary 
undertakings ; Sir John Hawkins stating, that by her quarto 
volume of "Miscellanies," to which Dr. Johnson was known 
to contribute much from his pen, she increased her little fund 
to three hundred pounds. Lady Knight thinks, that, ultimate- 
ly,^ she possessed an annual income of about thirty-five or forty 
pounds a year. This, which was partly obtained by Johnson's 
exertions on her behalf, was greatly aided by his unceasing 
kindness to her throughout her free abode in his house ; and 
we can perceive that his magnanimous spirit prompted him to 
treat her with as much politeness and humane consideration 
as though she had been a lady of the first quality and wealth. 

But, with all the alleviations provided for her, and with 
much cheerfulness under the sad deprivation of sight, she 
seems to have been of an irritable and peevish temper. All 
agree in their testimony of this, though some endeavor to 
palliate it. She would frequently quarrel with Johnson's 
favorite negro servant, and then would taunt him with the 

* Memoirs, vol. i. p. 49. 

t Alexander Chalmers's Biographical Dictionary, vol. xix. pp. 59- 
64. Johnson himself aftervv^ard proves the truth of Chalmers's state- 
ment. 



66 DR. .JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

money spent on Barber's education, saying, This is your scholar, 
on whose education you have spent £30U." On one occa- 
sion, Boswell, who had long observed her asperity of manner, 
says, " Mrs. Williams was very peevish ; and I wondered 
at Johnson's patience with her now, as I had often done on 
similar occasions. The truth is, that his humane consider- 
ation of the forlorn and indigent state in which this lady 
was left by her father, induced him to treat her with the 
utmost toiderness." Johnson himself writes of her, when he 
had procured her accommodation in the country, on account 
of illness, "Age, sickness, and pride, have made her so 
peevish, that I was forced to bribe the maid to stay with her 
by a stipulation of half-a-crown a week over her wages." 
He had supplied her with all conveniences to make her ex- 
cursion and abode pleasant and useful. The next year, in a 
letter to Mrs. Thrale, he writes : " Williams hates every body ; 
Levett hates Desmoulins, and does not love Williams ; Des~ 
moulins hates them both ; Poll (Miss Carmichael) loves none 
of them." During her illness heever spoke tenderly of her, and 
in his diary this affecting record is made, " This has been a day 
of great emotion ; the office of the Communion for the Sick has 
been performed in poor Mrs. Williams's chamber. At home 

I see almost all my companions dead or dying I hope 

that I shall learn to die as dear Williams is dying, who was 
very cheerful before and after this awful solemnity, and seems 
to resign herself with calmness and hope upon eternal mercy." 
To Doctor Brocklesby he writes : "Be so kind as to continue 
your attention to Mrs. Williams. It is a great consolation 
to the well, and still greater to the sick, that they find them- 
selves not neglected ; and I know that you will be desirous 
of giving comfort, even where you have no great hope of 
giving hel2')." On hearing of her death, he was much af- 
fected, and composed a solemn prayer on the event. To Mrs. 
Montague, who had allowed her a pension, he writes to com- 
municate the tidings of her death, and says, " You have, 
madam, the satisfaction of having alleviated the sufferings of 
a woman of great merit, both intellectual and moral." To 
Mr. Langton, he writes, " I have lost a companion (Mrs. 
Williams), to Avhom I have had recourse for domestic amuse- 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 67 

ment for thirty years, and whose variety of knowledge never 
was exhausted ; and now return to a habitation vacant and 
desolate." And in another to the same friend he alludes to 
Mrs. Williams, "whose death, following that of Levett, has 
now made my house a solitude. She left her little substance 
to a charity school. She is, I hope, where there is neither dark- 
ness" (in reference to her blindness), "nor want, nor sorrow." 
Mrs. JDesmoulins was another inmate of Dr. Johnson's 
house, and a recipient of his charity ; she also was the daughter 
of a physician, who left a large family in poverty, she herself 
having made an imprudent marriage, and now become a 
widow. Johnson allowed her half-a-guinea a week, above 
a twelfth part of his pension, and also lodged her daughter 
under his roof. On Good Friday, 1779, we find this record 
in his diary : " I maintain Mrs. Desmoulins and her daughter ; 
other good of myself I know not where to find, except a little 
charity." We find him also writing to the K-ev. Dr. Vyse, 
to ask for the situation of matron of the Chartreux for her, 
and he says, " She is in great distress, and therefore may prob- 
ably receive the benefit of a chaiutable foundation." Such an 
appointment (which she did not obtain) would have relieved 
Dr. Johnson, but at the same time, he was well aware that 
it would have added to her comfort and self-respect, albeit to 
be a pensioner of Dr. Johnson's was not without honor. She 
did not live altogether in peace with the other inmates, for 
Johnson records, " To-day Mrs. Williams and Mrs. Desmoulins 
had a scold, and Williams was going away ; but I bid her 
not turn tail, and she came back, and rather got the upper 
hand." Again, to Mrs. Thrale he writes : "Mr. Levett and 
Mrs. Desmoulins have vowed eternal hate." Yet Johnson, 
when she was absent, regretted the loss of her society, and she, 
to the last, was a faithful friend to him, sitting in his sick 
chamber at the moment of his death. This conduct does 
not justify a remark of Boswell's, who, when speaking of her 
reception i\nder Johnson's roof, says, "whose doors were always 
open to the unfortunate, and who well observed the precept 
of the Gospel, for he was kind to the unthankful and to the 
evil.'" Mrs. Desmoulins, whatever may have been her 
transitory irritations, was neither unthankful nor evil. 



68 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

Passing over Miss Carmichael, of whom so little is known, 
come we to the unfortunate Mr. Robert Levett. In the 
story of this man there is much of mingled goodness and 
romance. An Englishman by birth, and the eldest of ten 
children, he commenced life as a waiter at a coffee-house in 
Paris, where some surgeons, who frequented the house, took a 
liking to him, themselves taught him something of their art, 
and obtained free admission for him to the lectures of their 
ablest professors in pharmacy and anatomy. In London he 
became a popular practitioner among the humbler classes, 
who, of course, could afford to pay him only very small sums, 
and often paid him in kind. As regards his marriage, he 
was made the victim of an artful and profligate woman, and 
yet he was nearly sixty years of age at this time. Johnson 
writes to Baretti, "Levett is lately married; not without 
much suspicion that he has been wretchedly cheated in his 
match ; " and he used further to say, that compared with the 
marvels of this transaction, the Arabian Nights seemed 
familiar occurrences. It appears that she persuaded Levett, 
although he became acquainted with her under the poorest 
circumstances, that she was unrighteously kept out of a large 
fortune ; yet, before he had been married four months, a writ 
was taken out against him for debts contracted by her. Then 
he was obliged to be secreted, but ere long she ran away 
from him, was tried at the Old Bailey for robbery, acquitted, 
and a separation took place ; from that time, Johnson taking 
him to his home. All this misfortune only moved the com- 
passionate heart of Johnson ; and he was remarkable for 
standing by those who were distressed, and relieving those 
who could never recompense him. He seems to have been 
a man of ungainly appearance, for Boswell contrasts the 
"awkward and uncouth Robert Levett" with the brilliant 
Colonel Forester, of the Guards, who wrote the " Polite 
Philosopher," when showing that Dr. Johnson associated 
with persons most widely different in manners, abilities, rank, 
and accomplishments ; at the same time, Boswell thought 
well of him, for, in a letter to Johnson, he says, "I wish 
many happy years to good Mr. Levett, who, I suppose, holds 
his usual place at your breakfast table." Levett seems to 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 69 

have held the matutinal appointment of lord of the tea-kettle, 
and in the absence of the other inmates, to have become tea- 
maker. Johnson, who always treated him with "marked 
courtesy," as though he was an equal or more, and when 
absent, writing kindly to him, would observe, that "Levett 
was indebted to him for nothing more than house-room, his 
share in a penny loaf at breakfast, and now and then a 
dinner on a Sunday." This was no mean debt, but how in- 
significant when compared with that contracted from the 
constant experience of Johnson's condescension and courtesy. 
He resided for about twenty years under this great man's 
roof, "who," says Stevens, "never wished him to be regard- 
ed as an inferior, or treated him like a dependent." His 
temper, notwithstanding, seems to have been irritable, and 
perhaps sullen. It has already been seen that " Levett hates 
Desmoulins : " and we find again Dr. Johnson himself saying, 
"Mr. Levett and Mrs. Desmoulins have vowed eternal hate. 
Levett is the more insidious, and tvants me to turn her out :" 
and again, "Mrs. Williams is come home better, and the 
habitation is all concord and harmony, only Mr. Levett har- 
bors discontent.'''' It was not long, however, before Mrs. 
Williams and Mrs. Desmoulins had a violent quarrel, so con- 
tinually was dissension arising among those who may be almost 
termed his pensioners. 

Yet Johnson held him in great esteem, and regretted him 
in his death. To Mr. Laurence he communicates the intel- 
ligence of " our old friend's" death, and remarks : " So has 
ended the long life of a very useful, and very blameless man." 
To Mrs. Thrale he writes, " My home has lost Levett ; a 
man who took interest in every thing, and therefore ready at 
conversation ;" to Mrs. Porter, " The loss of friends will be 
felt, and poor Levett has been a faithful adherent for thirty 
years;" and to Captain Langton, "At night, at Mrs. 
Thrale's, as I was musing in my chamber, I thought, with 
uncommon earnestness, that, however I might alter my mode 
of life, or whithersoever I might remove, I would endeavor 
to retain Levett about me : in the morning my servant 
brought me word that Levett was called to another state ; a 
state for which, I think, he was not unprepared, lor he was 



70 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

very useful to the poor. Hoio much soever I valued him, I 
now wished that I had valued him more." We must con- 
strue the words, "for he was very useful to the poor," in con- 
junction with Dr. Johnson's belief in the merits and satisfac- 
tion of our Lord's death, and then we shall not be led astray 
by them. Poor Levett died very suddenly. " There passed 
not, I believe," says Johnson, " a minute between health and 
death." To others, he affectionately mentioned the decease 
of Levett ; but the man is immortalized rather by Johnson's 
pathetic verses, the first three stanzas of which may be ap- 
propriately quoted here : 

" Condemn'd to Hope's delusive mine, 
As on we toil from day to day, 
By sudden blast or slow decline 
Our social comforts drop away. 

" Well tried through many a varying year, 
See Levett to the grave descend ; 
Officious, innocent, sincere, 

Of every friendless name the friend. 

" Yet still he fills affection'' s eye, 

Obscurely wise and coarsely kind : 
Nor, lettered arrogance, deny 
Thy praise to merit unrefined." 

Much as these verses may be written to the praise of poor 
Levett, yet how much more do they, unwittingly, commem- 
orate the benevolent heart of the poet, of Avhom it had many 
years before been said, after the manner of Shakspeare's for- 
giving cardinal, when accused of showing kindness to a man 
of reported bad character, " He is now become miserable, 
and that insures the protection of Johnson." The following 
entry has been found in one of his memorandum books : 
" January 20, Sunday, Robert Levett was buried in the 
church-yard of Bridewell, between one and two in the after- 
noon. He died on Thursday, 17th, about seven the morning, 
by an instantaneous death. He was an old and faithful 
friend : I have known him from about 1746. Commendavi. 
May God have mercy on him I May He have mercy on 
me I" 

In the " Rambler" (No. 54), Dr. Johnson had written 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 71 

long before, " When a friend is carried to his grave, we at 
once find excuses for every weakness, and paUiations of every 

fault We consider, with the most afflictive anguish, 

the pain which we have given, and now can not alleviate, 
and the losses which we have caused, and now can not re- 
pair I" 

The notice of the inmates of Dr. Johnson's dwelling would 
not be complete without a brief sketch of Francis Barber, his 
faithful servant, almost uninterruptedly, for nearly thirty-two 
years. He was a negro, brought from Jamaica to this 
country by Colonel Bathurst, who, in his will, left him his 
freedom : and Johnson, who was probably poor at this time, 
seems to have taken him out of compassion for his forlorn 
state, as well as out of love to his intimate friend Dr. 
Bathurst, son of the colonel. It has been seen that Dr. 
Johnson put him to school, often wrote in terms of great 
kindness to him, and read and prayed with him. Twice, 
through some wayward fancy, he left his master, but was 
right glad to get into his old quarters again : for even when 
separated Johnson sought to do him good ; and the servant 
could not refrain from an occasional visit to his old master's 
house. He, too, when comfortably ensconced in his former 
service, did not escape a participation in the domestic dissen- 
sions, for we find that Johnson used to dread " having his 
ears filled with the complaints of Mrs. Williams, of Frank's 
neglect of his duty, and inattention to the interests of his 
master, and of Frank against Mrs. Williams, for the author- 
ity she assumed over him, and excercised with an unwar- 
rantable severity." It may easily be guessed on whose side 
the fault most lay, yet Johnson would have been the first to 
rebuke any impertinence ofiered to poor, ill-tempered Mrs. 
Williams. Boswell seems to have entertained a good opinion 
of Frank, saying, on one occasion, " I was happy to find my- 
self again in my friend's study, and was glad to see my old 
acquaintance, Mr. Francis Barber." In the famous picture 
of " A Literary party at Sir Joshua Reynolds's," Barber is 
represented in his capacity of servant, and one can not help 
thinking but that he, in common with the distinguished mem- 
bers of that evening's hospitality, even while bringing in 



?2 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

more wine, is casting his eyes toward his master, and hsten- 
ing to his rare discourse. 

Francis Barber had always been treated by Johnson as 
" a humble friend," and he was faithful to the last. His 
master, with his usual generous feeling, was mindful of him 
in his will, and having previously asked Dr. Brocklesby, 
what would be a proper annuity to a favorite servant, and 
the doctor answering that much depended on the circum- 
stances of the master, and that fifty pounds per annum would 
be considered a handsome reward from a nobleman : " Then," 
said Johnson, " shall I be noMlissimus, for I mean to leave 
Frank seventy pounds a year, and I desire you to tell him 
so." He did remember him handsomely in his will, and 
Barber retired to Lichfield, according to Dr. Johnson's re- 
quest, and died, in the year 1801, in the Infirmary at Staf- 
ford, after undergoing a painful operation.* 

Thus we have seen something of Dr. Johnson's household, 
and the unfortunate discord reigning therein ; all to the ad- 
vantage of his humane character with posterity. " The dis- 
sensions," says Mrs. Piozzi, " of the many odd inhabitants of 
his house, distressed and mortified him exceedingly. He was 
really sometimes afraid of going home, because he was so sure 
to be met at the door with numberless complaints ; and he 
used to lament that they made his life miserable from the 
impossibility he found of making theirs happy, when every 
favor he bestowed on one was wormwood to the rest." And 
how noble his forgiveness as well as his forbearance ! " If, 
however," continues this lady, " I ventured to blame their 
ingratitude, and condemn their conduct, he ^vould instantly 
set about softening the one, and justifying the other ; and 
finished commonly by telling me, that I knew not how to 
make allowances for situations I never experienced." Sir 
John Hawkins draws a still more distressing picture of these 
" enemies to his peace," and their insults, " all which he 
chose to endure, rather than put an end to their clamors, by 
ridding his home of such thankless and troublesome guests. 
Nay," adds the knight, " so insensible was he of the ingrati- 
tude of those whom he suffered thus to hang upon him, and 
* See Gentleman's Magazine, 1793. 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 73 

among whona he may be said to have divided an income 
xvhicU was little more than sufficient for his oivn sup'port, 
that he would submit to reproach and personal affront from 
some of them : even Levett would sometimes insult him ; 
and Mrs. Williams, in her paroxysms of rage, has been known 
to drive him from her presence." And to Mrs. Thrale he 
himself writes, " Mrs. Williams is not yet returned : but 
discord and discontent reign in my humble habitation as in 
the palaces of monarchs." How incomparably grand — how 
much after the pattern, though still at an infinite distance, 
of Deity itself, is Dr. Johnson's conduct in these instances I 
— when we know the full power of ridding and avenging 
himself of these rebellious disturbers that was at his com- 
mand ; that he had only to speak the word, and his home 
had become peaceable ; but, alas I they would have en- 
dured great deprivation. His strong mind regarded not its 
own discomfort, so long as temptation drove not compassion 
from his heart. Doubtless, his great literary pursuits ob- 
tained for him but a partial oblivion of these domestic broils, 
and it is of course most probable that he had often conflicts 
within himself on the occasions of these hostile scenes. Yet 
we may believe that a perception of the misery that would 
come upon these persons, did they once forsake the shelter of 
his roof, ever prevented the denial of his home and hospitality 
to them : and so he endured with consummate patience an 
evil that he could have put an end to, had not the far-seeing 
benevolence of his heart abhorred the summary proceeding 
which they, as it were, appeared to court ; or, at all events, 
the one wished the other to experience. What a picture is 
this of the larger world of ungrateful men, and God over 
all, provoked every day I 

D 



w 



CHAPTER VII. 

FURTHER INSTANCES. 

From much of Dr. Johnson's conduct in other ways, we 
perceive a kindness and tenderness of disposition. He usually- 
experienced a repentant sorrow on depreciating the character 
of others, or on speaking sharply to them. In that remark- 
able interview with George the Third in the Queen's Library 
at Buckingham House, he, in conversation with the king, 
exposed an error of Dr. Hill, who was really a sort of literary 
and medical quack. However, as soon as he began to dis- 
cover that he was depreciating the man in the eyes of his 
sovereign, he commenced saying something in his favor, and 
thus, in great measure, sought to remove the effect of what 
he had before, yet quite truly, spoken. Boswell mentions, 
that he had heard Sir Joshua Reynolds, " a nice and delicate 
observer of manners, particularly remark, that when upon 
any occasion Johnson had been rough to any person in com- 
pany, he took the first opportunity of reconciliation by drink- 
ing to him, or addressing his discourse to him ;" if, however, 
the other had not grace to accept this reconciliation, then it 
gave him no more concern. We have an instance of Dr. 
Johnson's kindness, in this manner, handsomely accepted. 
At a dinner Johnson had spoken roughly to Goldsmith, as 
indeed the latter somewhat deserved ; yet, on meeting in the 
evening at the club, Dr. Johnson observed Goldsmith sitting 
silently, and evidently sullen under the reprimand. He per- 
ceived this, and said aside to the others, " I'll make Gold- 
smith forgive me ;" and then called to him, in a loud voice, 
" Dr. Goldsmith, something passed to-day where you and I 
dined ; I ask your 'pardon." Goldsmith answered, placidly, 
" It must be much from you, sir, that I take ill." And so 
at once, observes Boswell, the difference was over, and they 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANiTV. 75 

were on as easy terms as ever, and Goldsmith rattled away 
as usual. 

Of Goldsmith we may say, Nilfuit unquam sic impar sibi ; 
and, as Machiavel said of Lorenzo de Medici, " The gravity 
of his life, if compared with its levity, must make him appear 
a composition of two different persons, each incompatible, 
and, as it were, impossible to be joined together." In the 
Life of Garrick we are told by its author, " The Doctor was 
a perfect heteroclite, an inexplicable existence in creation ;" 
at one time all envy and malice, and at another overflowing 
with generosity and benevolence, so that " he might be said 
to consist of two distinct souls." However, we are told that 
he always openly spoke his mind — that he never seriously 
formed any scheme, or joined in any combination, to hurt 
any man living — that he ever relieved the poor, and rather 
than not relieve the distressed, he would borrow — and when 
Baretti, whom he greatly disliked, was sent by Sir John 
Fielding to Newgate, on a charge of murder, he opened his 
purse, and would have given him every shilling it contained ; 
at the same time he insisted upon going in the coach with 
him to his place of confinement. 

The author of this book* says, " The first man of the age, 
who, from the extensiveness of his genius and benevolence of 
his mind, is superior to the little envy and mean jealousy 
which adhere so closely to most authors, and especially to 
those of equivocal merit, took pleasure in introducing Dr. 
Goldsmith to his intimate friends, persons of eminent rank 
and distinguished abilities." Yet we are told by the same 
authority, of Goldsmith, that when " his great literary fHend 
was commended in his hearing, he could not restrain his 
uneasiness, but exclaimed, in a kind of agony, 'No more, I 
desire you ; you harrow up my soul.' " Johnson well knew 
the envious feeling that was often in Goldsmith, and therefore 
the more observable is his kindness toward him ; and Gold- 
smith, as we have seen, could express himself highly of Dr. 
Johnson. It may be observed, that the being envious of 
another does not derogate, even in our own mind, from the 
dignity or excellence of that other ; it is only a sign, and to 
* The Memoirs of Ddvid Garrick, by Thomas Davies. 



76 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

ourselves, of a sense of our inferiority ; so that, putting the 
two anecdotes together, Goldsmitli may well think highly of 
Dr. Johnson, and still be impatient of hearing him praised. 
Few men, alas I pass through life free from envy, though all 
would disown the passion ; and our author writes, " I never 
knew any man but one (Dr. Johnson), who had the honor 
and courage to confess that he had a tincture of envy in 
him." 

We learn from Mrs. Piozzi, that when this very author 
(Thomas Davies) had printed some compositions of Dr. 
Johnson's, unknown to him, the Doctor was angry, and went 
up to London to speak to Davies about it. At his return 
Mrs. Thrale asked him how the matter ended. " Why," 
said he, " I was a fierce fellow, and pretended to be very 
angry, aiid Thomas was a good-natured fellow, and pretended 
to be very sorry ; so there the matter ended. I believe the 
dog loves me dearly. ' Mr. Thrale' (turning round to my 
husband), ' what shall you and I do that is good for Tom 
Davies ? We will do something for him, to be sure.' " 
The fact was, Davies was a poor man ;* and this circum- 
stance at once turned away the wrath of one with whom he 
had certainly taken a very great liberty ; for he not only 
published, without leave, pieces written by him, but he also 
published, together with these, pieces not written by Dr. 
Johnson, and yet sent them all forth as though composed by 
" the Author of the Rambler." He continued to love 
Davies cordially. " One day," says Boswell, " when he had 
treated him with too much asperity, Tom, who was not 
without pride and spirit, went off in a passion ; but he had 
hardly reached home, when Frank, who had been sent after 
him, delivered this note : ' Come, come, dear Davies, I am 
always sorry when we quarrel ; send me word that we are 
friends.' " Davies himself has written the " Life of Garrick," 
in a pleasing, sensible, kind-hearted manner ; and whenever 
he alludes therein to Dr. Johnson, it is in terms of the high- 
est admiration and praise. 

Very trifling things indicate the kind or unkind disposition 

* See Chalmers's Biog. Diet. vol. xi.-i. p. &6. 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 77 

of a man. Mr. Beauclerk had a portrait of Dr. Johnson, on 
the frame of which these words were inscribed : 

" Ingeiiium ingens 
Inculto latet hoc sub corpore." 
But when this picture, after Mr. Beauclerk's death, became 
the property of Mr. Langton, the words were removed. 
Johnson said, complacently, " It was kind in you to take it 
•oil';" and then, after a short pause, added, " and not unkind 
in him to put it on." 

Johnson was undoubtedly severe at times, and especially 
stout in maintaining an argument when aware that he was 
not altogether taking the best side ; but then, this was for 
the time only, for he would take an opportunity afterwai'd 
of confessing himself in the wrong. Thus, after a night's 
debate of this kind, he accosted Mr. Morgan, as soon as 
he met him in the breakfast- room next morning : " Sir, I 
have been thinking on our dispute last night : you were in 
the rights Boswell, endeavoring, on another occasion, to 
excuse him, offers this opinion on his great friend : " Plia- 
bility of address I conceive to be inconsistent with that ma- 
jestic power of mind which he possesses, and which produces 
such noble effects. A lofty oak will not bend like a supple 
willow." Yes, but why should "majestic power of mind" 
place itself in the predicament of requiring " pliability of 
address" in order to extricate itself, albeit such pliability be 
not exercised ? Occasional stubborness of mind, and a habit 
of giving harsh denials, are the least amiable traits in John- 
son's greatly benevolent character ; and these can hardly be 
excused. 

" Johnson's charity to the poor," writes Boswell, " was 
uniform and extensive, both from inclination and principle." 
Like Goldsmith, when he had exhausted his own purse in 
acts of liberality, he would beg for others, if in real distress ; 
this " he did judiciously as well -as humanely." The Pv-ev. 
Dr. Maxwell says, " He frequently gave all the silver in his 
pocket to the poor, who watched him between his house and 
the tavern where he dined." " Those," records Miss Pvey- 
nolds, " who knew his uniform benevolence, and its actua- 
ting principles — steady virtue and true holiness — will readily 



78 DR. JOHNSON'S HUxMANITY. 

agree with me, that peace and goodwill toward man were 
the natural emanations of his heart. I shall never forget 
the impression," she continues, " I felt in Dr. Johnson's 
favor, the first time I was in his company, on his saying, 
that, as he returned to his lodgings at one or two o'clock in 
them orning, he often saw poor children asleep on the thresh- 
olds and stalls, and that he used to put peniiies into their 
hands to huy them a breakfast^ " And this at a time," 
observes Croker, "when he himself was living on iJennies.'" 

Boswell observes, " Johnson's love of little children, which 
he discovered upon all occasions, calling them ' pretty dears,' 
and giving them sweatmeats, was an undoubted proof of the 
real humanity and gentleness of his disposition." 

Retrenchment in charity he thought should be the last 
consideration when obliged to economize. He writes to Mrs. 
Thrale, at the same time not allowing her to diminish a two- 
guinea annual subscription, " Whatever reasons you have for 
frugality, it is not worth while to save a guinea a year by 
withdrawing it from a public charity." But, beneficent as 
he Avas himself in almsgiving, he thought it better, in gen- 
eral, to spend money than to give it away. " A man," he 
said, " who spends his money, is sure he is doing good with 
it ; he is not so sure when he gives it away. A man who 
spends ten thousand a year will do more good than a man 
who spends two thousand" (in industry) " and gives away 
eight." 

Many, very many kind things did Dr. Johnson write and 
speak. How delighted he was with Boswell's kindness to an 
old man of eighty-eight, whom he had put into a dwelling 
more comfortable and suitable ; how he also besought him to 
be a kind landlord to his tenantry I With what pleasure he 
hears that he is on good terms with his father I " Cultivate 
his kindness," he writes, " by all honest and manly means. 

It is best not to be angry ; and best, in the next place, 

to be quickly reconciled. May you and your father pass the 
remainder of your time in reciprocal benevolence I" Again, 
in a later letter, " Please him as much as you can, and add 
no fain to his ktst years.''' 

To another correspondent, Mr. George Strahan, he had 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 79 

before said. " To give pain ought always to be painful." 
What a golden saying I " Those who have loved longest," 
he tells Mrs. Thrale, " love best." " A friend may be often 
found and lost ; but an old friend never can be found." He 
always felt severely the loss of old friends, and says in a 
melancholy manner to Mrs. Strahan, " When we have all 
done all that we can, one friend must in time lose the other !" 
He was a firm friend to many, and remarkably so to the 
unfortunate Dr. Dodd, who fervently addressed him at the 
last, " Accept, thou great and good heart, my earnest and 
fervent thanks for all thy benevolence and kind efforts in my 
behalf. Oh, Dr. Johnson I as I sought your knowledge in 
an early hour of life, would to Heaven I had cultivated the 
love and acquaintance of so excellent a man I" &c. Cer- 
tainly, Dr. Johnson's efforts on behalf of this wretched man 
were astonishing — even invoking the supreme (human) power 
to pay attention to the voice of the people — a voice not 
usually invested by him with a tittle too much reverence. 

How beautiful is his record, after being in the house at 
the time of Mr. Thrale's death : "I felt almost the last 
flutter of his pulse, and looked for the last time upon the 
face that for fifteen years had never been turned upon one 
but ivith respect or benignity. Farewell. May God, that 
delighteth in mercy, have had mercy on thee I" How be- 
nign, too, is this extract from one of his little manuscript 
diaries : " Afternoon spent cheerfully and elegantly, I hope 
without offense to God or man : though in no holy duty, yet 
in the general exercise and cultivation of benevolence I" and 
how mildly, yet firmly, does he remonstrate with Mrs. Piozzi 
on her marriage : " I breathe out," he says, in the commence- 
ment, " one sigh more of tenderness, perhaps useless, but at 
least sincere 1" 

A man that is kind to others will always most sensibly 
appreciate any kindness done to himself We see this exem- 
plified in many cases in Dr. Johnson's career ; and especially 
toward its close was he thankful for any kind conduct shown 
toward him by his friends. How hearty his expressions, when 
told of the applications made to Lord Thurlow for means 
by which a journey to Italy, on account of his health, might 



80 DR, JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

be accomplished : " This," said he "is taking prodigious 
pains about a man I" " Oh, sir," said Bos well, with most 
sincere affection, " your friends would do every thing for you I" 
He paused — grew more and more agitated — till tears started 
into his eyes, and he exelaimed with fervent emotion, " God 
bless you all I" After a short silence, Boswell being affected 
to tears, he renewed and extended his grateful benediction : 
" God bless you all, for Jesus Christ's sake !" He rose sud- 
denly, and quitted the room, quite melted in tenderness. 

Johnson was always kind and affectionate to Boswell, for 
whom he had evidently a sincere esteem, whatever he thought 
of the powers of his mind : and even, on an occasion when 
Boswell thought that Dr. Johnson had rudely interrupted 
him in a conversation at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, and ex- 
pressed his sense of uneasiness, " Well," exclaimed Johnson, 
" I am sorry for it. I'll make it up to you, twenty different 
ways, as you please." Mrs. Boswell did not like Johnson, 
but nothing can exceed the playfulness of his constant allu- 
sions to her dislike. On her husband's return home, he 
writes to this good lady, " Pray take care of him, and tame 
him. The only thing in which I have the honor to agree 
with you is, in loving him." In a letter to Boswell, he 
says, " I hope my irreconcileable enemy, Mrs. Boswell, is 
well. Desire her not to transmit her malevolence to the 
young people :" and soon after, " If Mrs. Boswell would be 
but friends with me, we might now shut the temple of 
Janus." In a little time Mrs. Boswell begins to relent, and 
Boswell conveys her compliments to Dr. Johnson, and com- 
municates that she is about to send him some orange mar- 
malade of her own making. Johnson replies that he is glad 
that his old enemy begins to feel some remorse, and jocularly 
says, " Tell Mrs. Boswell that I shall taste her marmalade 
cautiously at first ; Timeo Danaos et dona ferentcs. ' Be- 
ware,' says the Italian proverb, ' of a reconciled enemy.' 
But when I find it does me no harm, I shall then receive 
it, and be thankful for it, as a pledge of firm, and I hope of 
unalterable kindness. She is, after all, a dear, dear lady.''' 
To Mrs. Boswell herself he writes, "Very little of the 
pleasure which I received at the arrival of your jar of mar- 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 81 

malade arose from eating it. I received it as a token of 
friendship, as a proof of reconciliation, things much sweeter 
than sweetmeats,'" &c. ; and he congratulates himself, that, 
by having her kindness, he has a double security for the con- 
tinuance of Mr. Boswell's. On hearing of her illness, he 
writes in affectionate terms of much concern, and soon after, 
says, " Tell her, I hope we shall be at variance no more I" 
Afterward, he urges Boswell to bring her to London for 
change of air, aird characteristically says, " / loill retire 
from my ajMrtments for her accommodation.. Behave 
kindly to her, and keep her cheerful." It is gratifying to 
find that Mrs. Boswell reciprocated this kindness, for in al- 
lusion to some epistle, he writes to Boswell, " Such a letter 
as Mrs. Boswell's might draw any man not wholly motion- 
less a great way. Pray tell the dear lady how much her 
civility and kindness have touched and gratified me." It 
may be remarked that Johnson always addressed the female 
in more endearing terms than the male sex, never to the 
latter exceeding " Dear Sir," while to the former, " dear, 
dear," "dearest, dearest," "beloved," &c., are frequently 
met with. Previous to his answer to Mrs. Boswell's letter, 
he had written to her husband, " I love you so much, that I 
would be glad to love all that love you, and that you love : 
and I have love very really for Mrs. Boswell, if she thinks it 
worthy of acceptance :" and he had also said to Mr. Bos- 
well, " Were I in distress, there is no man to whom I should 
sooner come than to you. I should like to come and have 
a cottage in your park, toddle about, live mostly on milk, 
a7td be taken care of by Mrs. Bo&ivell. She and I are 
good friends now ; are we not ?" On this knowledge, prob- 
ably, of Johnson's attachment to her husband, and herself, 
and their locality also, she sent a cordial invitation on hear- 
ing of his illness : and so ended the " fytte" of stalwart knight 
and lady fair. 

With him, indeed, all was open and sincere. He never 
pretended to feel, but ever reduced his feelings to practice. 
When Boswell once said, that he had often blamed himself 
for not feeling for others so sensibly as many say they do, 
Johnson replied, " Sir, don't be duped by them any more. 



82 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

You will find these very feeling people are not very ready to 
do you good. They 2J(^2/ yon hy feeli?ig." And, at another 
time, when Boswell made much the same observation, he 
said, " Sir, it is affectation to pretend to feel the distress of 
others as much as they do themselves.* It is equally so, as 
if one should pretend to feel as much pain while a friend's 
leg is cutting off, as he does. No, sir I you have expressed 
the rational and just nature of sympathy. I would have 
gone to the extremity of the earth to have preserved this 
(Mr. Thrale's) boy." In a multitude of instances this opin- 
ion of Dr. Johnson's may be decidedly the true one, but 
there are cases in which, cases of intimate relation and 
friendship, we may feel for another's calamity more intensely 
than he feels for himself, even to the laying down our lives 
for our friends — while assuredly, there is, alas ! far too much 
of the spirit denounced by St. James (James ii. 16), in the 
world. Dr. Johnson was wholly free from this ; he did sub- 
stantial good. " He told me the other day," says Hannah 
More, " he hated to hear people whine about metaphysical 
distresses, when there was so much want and hunger in the 
world." And she, who knew and loved Johnson, has hit 
off his character with her usual smartness of observation. 
"In Dr. Johnson," she writes, "some contrarieties very har- 
moniously meet : if he has too little charity for the opinions 
of others, and too little patience with their faults, he Jias the 
greatest tenderness for their persons.''' Yes, as we have 
seen, no man forgave more readily than he did, when occa- 
sionally hurried on to passion, or to rude contradiction, by 
some slight provocation, or through impatience at some re- 
sistance, or non-acquiescence to his authority. But in all 
cases of a serious kind, he practiced the noblest part of true 

* In the Ravibler (No. 99) he says, " To love all men is our duty, 
so far as it includes a general habit of benevolence, and readiness of 
occasional kindness ; but to love all equally is impossible," &c. 

" The necessities of our condition require a thousand offices of ten- 
derness, which mere regard for the species will never dictate. Every 
man has frequent grievances which only the solicitude of friendship 
will discover and remedy, and which would remain forever unheeded 
in the mighty heap of human calamity, were it only surveyed by the 
eye of general benevolence, equally attentive to every misery." 



DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 83 

charity, and could worthily reason with himself, in the words 
of a divine before quoted, * " 'Tis true he hath wronged me, 
but unless it were for conquering wrongs, what need have 
I of Christian patience ! Where is the meekness of the 
Christian spirit, if I am hurried away by the same passion 
with an heathen and infidel I" And might we not sup- 
pose that this passage was Avritten by Johnson himself? for 
it is just what he was accustomed to do : "In the survey 
of my daily deportment, which I make each night, I drag 
forth the crime, (impatience, &c.); into the awful presence 
of an holy God ! and there arraigning it of all the m^s- 
cliiefs it hath done me, of all the troubles it hath given 
me, and laying before myself seriously and devoutly all the 
obligations I have to the practice of the contrary virtue, I 
condemn it ivith an holy indignation, I cover myself with 
shame and sorrow, and renew most solemn resolutions 
against it, and earnestly beg of God his assistance against 
his and mine enemy.'^ This is the repentant course of a 
great mind awakened to a just sense of its responsibility ; and 
whoever peruses the holy Meditations and Prayers of Dr. 
Johnson, can not fail to see that such was the manner of 
his powerful rebuke of self, and of forming resolutions, depend- 
ent on divine support, to conform himself more and more to 
the will and commands of the Almighty : 

" Safe in His power, whose eyes discern from far 
Tlie secret ambush of a specious prayer : 
Implore His aid, in His decisions rest 
Secure, whate'er He gives, He gives the best."t 

" We are brothers," writes Dr. Johnson, % " as we are 
men ; we are again brothers as we are Christians : as men, 
we are brothers by natural necessity ; but as Christians, we 
are brothers by voluntary choice, and are therefore under an 

* Lucas on Holiness, p. 104, sixth edition. 

t Johnson's Poems, p. 35; Kearsley, 1785. 

X In Sermon XI. of " Sermons on different subjects,'' advertised as 
written by Dr. Taylor, but clearly of Dr. Johnson's composition. 
Bishop Porteus and Mr. Croker have no doubt of this. The above 
sermon has, perhaps, fewer of the characteristics of Johnson's style 
than some of the others. 

\ 



84 DR. JOHNSON'S HUMANITY. 

apparent obligation to fulfill the relation : first, as it is es- 
tablished by our Creator, and afterward, as it is chosen by 
ourselves. To have the same opinions naturally produces 
kindness, even when these opinions have no consequence : 
because we rejoice to find our sentiments approved by the 
judgment of another. But those who concur in Christian- 
ity, have, by that agreement in principle, an opportunity of 
more than speculative kindness : they may help forward the 
salvation of each other, by counsel or by reproof, by exhort- 
ation, by example : they may recall each other from devia- 
tions, they may excite each other to good works." Good 
would it be, if there were more of this brotherhood in the 
Christian Church. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

HIS CHURCHMANSHIP. 

Dr. Johnson's religion was that of the Church of En- 
gland, as set forth in her liturgy, at once reasonable and 
devotional. His father had been a zealous high Churchman 
and royalist, and always retained his attachment to the un- 
fortunate family of Stuart, although he reconciled himself, as 
Bos well tells us, " by casuistical arguments of expediency and 
necessity, to take the oaths imposed by the prevailing power." 
We find that in the reign of Queen Anne he was elected 
a magistrate and brother of the corporation of Lichfield, 
having taken the oath of allegiance, and that " he "believed 
there Avas no transubstantiation in the sacrament of the 
Lord's Supper." This latter he might, consistently with his 
religious views, apart from his political, have done ; for so 
might Bishop Ken, who strenuously combated the errors of 
the Roman Catholic rehgion, and others who continued to 
be non-jurors : but the oath of allegiance as yet was quite a 
different subject of consideration. His son, however he ad- 
mired the character of James the Second, and detested the 
conduct of William the Third, * was yet a Church and 

* William the Third was, nevertheless, in many respects a great 
man. Certainly, he had little taste for literature, the sciences, wit, 
and oratory, and he was ever guarded in speech, and famous for secret 
reserve ; yet he was an able politician, and his skill and bravery in 
war almost unequaled. He was early called into difficult action, there- 
fore his experience had to be learned from his own failures : and this 
he must have felt, for he once exclaimed, " I would give a good part 
of my estates to have served a few campaigns under the Prince of 
Conde, before I had to command against him." Goldsmith hardly 
does him justice : Macaulay speaks of him as a veritable hero. Of his 
religious opinions, the latter brilliant historian says, and we must 
recollect that the Princes of Orange had generally been patrons of the 
Calvinistic divinity : " He had ruminated on the great enigmas which 
had been discussed in the synod of Dort, and had found in the austere 



86 DE. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIF. 

King man before the non-jurors became so, who only on the 
death of the Pretender at Rome (1788) began to pray for 
the reigning monarch. Boswell records, singularly enough, 
though certainly late in Johnson's life (1784), that at an 
agreeable party at Dr. Nowell's, " we drank ' Church and 
King' after dinner, with true Tory cordiality :'" * and it is 
related before, that Dr. Johnson found fault with Archbishop 
Seeker, whose life he said deserved to be recorded, though 
he differed with him in politics, because the Archbishop in 
lieu of " Church and King" gave " Constitution in Church 

and inflexible logic of the Genevese school something which suited his 
intellect and temper. The example of intolerance, indeed, which some 
of his predecessors had set, he never imitated. For all persecution he 
felt a fixed aversion, which he avowed, not only where the avowal was 
obviously politic, but on occasions where it seemed that his interest 
would have been promoted by dissimulation or silence. His theolog- 
ical opinions, however, were even more decided than those of his ances- 
tors. The tenet of predestination was the key-stone of his religion." 
At this time the Protestants of the United Provinces were divided into 
two great religious parties, which '" almost exactly coincided with two 
great political parties." The Arminian party were regarded in the 
light of Papists by the multitude. It is easy to see to which division, 
both religiously and politically, Dr. Johnson would have belonged. He 
liked not the doctrine of predestination, and would not argue upon it 
— perhaps from a dislike to enter conversationally upon a subject so 
replete with mystery, so above the reason of man, and demanding so 
much of our reverential awe. It " was a part of the clamor of the 
times," he said, "so it is mentioned in our Articles, but with as little 
positiveness as could be." The fullness and wisdom of the 17th Ar- 
ticle will strike most persons, and it seems to satisfy the demands of 
the sensible and judicious of each party. 

* Georee Hardinge, the Welsh Judge, nephew of Lord-Chancellor 
Camden, calls Johnson "the most avowed and flaming tory of his 
age," and yet Dr. Johnson wrote the Latin inscription which is at the 
foot of the picture of the Whig Lord Camden in Guildhall. 

Lord Camden was always on the popular side, both at college and 
in after life. What was said of this great lawyer, might with the utmost 
fitness be said of our great man of literature, "No man ever breathed 
who had such an abhorrence of obscenity, or of an imjiroper liberty 
with sacred names." His lordship was in the constant habit of asso- 
ciating with artists and men of lettei's, and throughout life he was an 
eager devourer of romances, in which taste he was joined by Pitt, Fox, 
Lord Mansfield, Bishop Warburton, Bishop Jebb, and other most 
eminent personages. See Lives of the Chancellors, by Lord Camp- 
bell, vol. V. p. 238, &c. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 87 

and State :" and on being asked what difference there was 
between the two toasts, said, "Why, sir, you may be sure 
he meant something T In those and previous days the well 
established toast of " Church and King," may have embodied 
the further significancy of " Church and 7io Pope,'' and 
hence meant more than the mere expression of loyalty as in 
the present time. But Johnson, who despised King William, 
and thought meanly of the first and second Georges, held 
George the Third in high regard, as " the only king who for 
almost a century has much appeared to desire, or much 
endeavored to deserve," the affections of the people : a king 
who knows not the name of party, and who wishes to be the 
common father of all his people." * 

Dr. Johnson was certainly a Jacobite, and he took delight 
in talking of Jacobitism, but his zeal wonderfully abated 
with the advancement of years, and and the absence of a 
really arousing cause. And Tories and non-jurors, once op- 
posed to the ruling sovereigns and their courts, have more 
and more continued to acquiesce in the settled change, and 
become more prominent than the Whigs in their attachment 
to royalty, as represented by the Hanoverian line, and to the 
established religion ; and somewhat of a revolution must take 
place ere Dr. Pusey become a Sacheverell ardently backed 
by the populace ; or an Atterbury reveal himself on the 
episcopal bench ; or seven bishops be committed to the 
Tower for contempt of the regal succession. No, the 
descendants of the strong opposition party have now become, 
by easy degrees, the eminently conservative power in Church 
and State. 

And this gradual working went on largely during the 
reign of George the Third, silently stealing on the mind of 
Dr. Johnson in common with that of others : for, in the 
nature of things, there must always be a conservative 
strength accumulating, and if the Church of England were 
changed to-morrow from Episcopacy to Presbytery, we should 
find this same Presbytery, in the course of years, as in the 
case of Scotland, assuming the conservative principle, and con- 
tending against the innovations and agitations of new parties 
* The False Alarm, 1770. 



88 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

arising in opposition to its sway. Little did our reformers 
imagine that with hke feeling as they regarded the Church 
of Rome, bodies of men would rise up and cordially contemn 
the result of the operations of their tongues, hands, and lives, 
even the Reformed Church I 

It may be supposed that the year 1745 would have made 
the blood flow fast, and the pulse beat hopefully in the 
Jacobite faction : that Balmerino's cry on the scaffold, of 
" God bless King James," would have stirred into action the 
minds and bodies of all who in any degree adhered to the 
cause. And yet Boswell says of Dr. Johnson, " I have 
heard him declare, that if holding up his right hand would 
have secured victory at Culloden to Prince Charles's army, 
he was not sure he tvould have held it tip : so little confi- 
dence had he in the right claimed by the House of Stuart, 
and so fearful was he of the consequences of another revolu- 
tion on the throne of Great Britain." And at another time 
he said to Mr. Langton, " Nothing has ever offered that 
has made it worth my while to consider the question fully. '' 
He also said to the same, talking of King James the Second, 
whom he afterward unaccountably calls " a very good king," 
that " it was become impossible for him to reign any longer 
in this country." And, so much does the antagonistic spirit 
of the human mind contribute to the vehemence of maintain- 
ing opinions, he was heard to say, " that after the death of 
a violent Whig, with whom he used to contend with great 
eagerness, he felt his Toryism much abated." So true is it, 
that we are half won over, when we cease to care for victory 
in argument : and that Dr. Johnson knew this to be a cer- 
tain principle in human nature. We find that once when 
his friend the Rev. Dr. Taylor commended a physician, and 
told Johnson how he had to contend in his behalf with per- 
sons of the neighborhood, "You should consider, sir," he re- 
plied, " that by every one of your victories he is a loser : for 
every man of ivhom you get the better will be angry and 
resolve not to employ him : whereas if people get the better 
of you in argument about him, they'll think, ' We'll send for 
him, nevertheless.' " How well would it be if controversial 
theologians, among Churchmen and Dis.senters equally, would 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 89 

consider the bearing of this anecdote on their many profit- 
less discussions, and we should not see the implacably hostile 
array of the combatants that we are now compelled to wit- 
ness, each the more angered, and not convinced to confession, 
on defeat. 

In earlier years, Dr. Johnson had been a more thorough 
Jacobite.* Once he said to a young lady, " My dear, I 

* Di". Johnson's political principles were attacked by one Joseph 
Towers ; especially, his " Taxation no Tyranny" was handed with 
severity. Dr. Towers was a Unitarian preacher, a zealous adherent 
of the Resolution of 1688, a member of the Revolution Society in 
London, one who approved of the execution of Charles the First, 
applauded the actors in the French Revolution, held the democratic 
sentiments of Milton, argued in favor of Locke's liberal philosophy 
against the accusations of Dean Tucker, opposed the views of Edmund 
Burke in regard to the revolution in France, and liked neither ecclesi- 
astical establishments nor standing armies. Such a one, we may be 
sure, could not approve of the principles held by Dr. Johnson. He 
wrote several tracts and pamphlets ; and among these, a " Letter to 
Dr. Johnson, occasioned by his late Political Publications," and also 
"An essay on the Life, Character, and Writings of Dr. Johnson." At 
the commencement of this essay, he trusts too much to sayings related 
by Mrs. Piozzi, who was by no means worth}'' of implicit credit ; but 
on the whole, as is usual with Dr. Towers, there is much fairness in 
his view, as a political adversary, of Dr. Johnson's character ; and he 
always pays the profoundest obeisance to the powers of his mind, and 
the goodness and piety of his heart. He curiously ends his Essay by 
saying, " The faults and foibles of Dr. Johnson, whatever they were, 
are now descended with him to the grave ; but his virtues should be 
the object of our imitation." And yet some of those " faults 'and 
foibles" he has endeavored to rescue from the oblivion of the grave ! 

No one can rise from the perusal of this Essay, without still cherish- 
ing a very exalted opinion of Dr. Johnson, as a man of extraordinary 
intellectual power, and religious conduct. Boswell is pleased with the 
observation of Dr. Towers, and gives an extract from the Essay. He 
also says, that although he abhors his Whiggish, democratical propen- 
sities, yet that he esteems him as "an ingenious, knowing, and very 
convivial man." 

The Sermons of Dr. Towers were rather moral essays, cold and sens- 
ible after the manner of Unitarian writers. It may be remarked, that 
in a letter -written by the Duke de Rochefoucault to Dr. Price, on the 
occasion of an address from the Revolution Society in London- to the 
National Assembly in Paris, congratulating them on the French Revo- 
lution, this nobleman writes, " The dawn of a glorious day, in which 
two nations loho had always esteemed each other, notwithstanding their 
political divisions and the diversity of their governments, should con- 



90 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

hope you are a Jacobite ?" And on her uncle (the elder Mr. 
Langton, hunself a Tory) remonstrating with him for put- 
ting such a question, " Why, sir," he replied, " I meant no 
offense to your niece, I meant her a great coynpliinent. A 
Jacobite, sir, believes in the divine right of kings. He that 
believes in the divine right of kings believes in a Divinity. 
A Jacobite believes in the divine right of bishops. He that 
believes in the divine right of bishops, believes in the divine 
authority of the Christiaii religion. Therefore, sir, a Jacobite 
is neither an atheist nor a deist. That can not be said of a 
Whig ; for Whiggism is a negation of all principle " 
And yet, according to this harsh definition, Johnson was 
somewhat of a Whig himself in this matter. Neither was 
he a steadfast non-juror advocate, although he must have 
approved of the abstract principle. Once he expressed an 
opinion that a non-juror would be more criminal in refusing 
the oaths than in taking them, because the refusal might 
injure him in his livelihood, and tempt him to crime. Such 
a mode of reasoning would have come better from Paley 
than Dr. Johnson, but in this case of submission to the 
reigning monarch, whatever might have been the original 
seating of his family on the throne, the doctor seems to have 
agreed with what Paley has written, who, although giving 
a strong preference to an hereditary rather than an elective 
monarchy, yet says, " If the house of Lancaster, or even the 
posterity of Cromwell, had been at this day seated upon the 
throne of England, we should have been as little concerned 
to inquire how the founder of the family came there." We 
may think that Dr. Johnson, and very many other Tories 
who held opinions identical with his, wisely beheld their 
"civil obligation resolved into expediency:" and not seeing 
sufficient cause for opposition or rebellion, cheerfully consented 
to the laws emanating from the present line of succession, 
and to the regal succession itself. This could hardly be done 

tract an intimate union, founded on the sirnilarity of their opinions, 
and their common enthusiasm for liberty." And yet, after all this, 
England resounded with the fife and drum, arousing her inhabitants of 
every town and village, and enlisting them in arms against France ; 
and we beheld the long and arduous continental war crowned by the 
victory of Waterloo ! 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 91 

by one who disliked and abhorred "the tabefaction of all 
principles ;" and we can only ascribe this indiflerence of Dr. 
Johnson, coupled with his subsequent receipt of a pension, 
to a steadily increasing change of opinion : to be less won- 
dered at, when we know he himself had never been in a non- 
juring meeting-house, and did not think highly of the non- 
jurors themselves, although there were, doubtlessly, men of 
the highest character and ability in their ranks. 

Only thus briefly glancing at the political hue of Dr. 
Johnson's churchmanship, let us look more steadily at its 
devotional and practical interiority. He always seemed to 
love the church from his heart. On one occasion, when it 
was told him that himself and a friend usually met at church, 
" Sir," said he, "it is the best place we can meet in, except 
heaven, and I hope we shall meet there too." He could not 
conscientiously enter a Presbyterian place of worship, and 
when refusing to go and hear Principal Robertson preach, 
he said, " I will hear him, if he wall get up into a tree and 
preach : but I will not give a sanction, by my presence, 
to a Presbyterian assembly." We must bear in mind that 
Dr. Johnson's sanction, was a thing that could not be hid, 
and often would be construed into a fact of public approval ; 
indeed a mere indulgent act of curiosity, compliance, or care- 
lessness, might be invested with an importance exceedingly 
annoying to him, and directly adverse to his religious 
scruples. 

When he was in his forty-seventh year he was offered a 
living by the elder Mr. Langton, if he were inclined to enter 
into Holy Orders.* But this offer he conscientiously de- 
clined. It was situated in a pleasant part of the country, 
and of tolerable annual income. Moreover, it appears that at 
this time Johnson was in straitened circumstances,! and his 

* It may be said of Johnson, as it was said of Addison by Lord 
Halifax, when his lordship kept him out of the church — "I believe it 
is the only injury he will ever do it." — Boivycrs Memoirs, p. 65. 

t In this year Dr. Johnson was miserably poor. He would have 
been arrested for debt in February, had not ]NIr. Richardson bailed him. 
In the month of INIareh he was under arrest for five pounds eighteen 
shillings, and was compelled to borrow six guineas of Mr. Richardson. 
Yet it was a year (1756) of great kindness from him toward others. 



92 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

London friends had become scattered ; but his reason of re- 
fusal v/as cogent : "I have not," he said, " the requisites for 
the office, and I can not in conscience shear the flock which 
I am unable to feed.'' This is related by Sir John Haw- 
kins, and Boswell says, that Johnson felt that his temper and 
habits rendered him unfit for continual instruction of the vul- 
gar and ignorant, which he held "to be an essential duty in 
a clergyman ;" and moreover, that Johnson's love of a Lon- 
don life rendered the thought of a residence in the country 
wearisome and lonely. This latter and lower motive may 
have influenced him in some degree ; for we find when he 
was afterward staying at Langton (the name of the rectory 
ofTered him), though he had the privilege of a good library, 
and saw several of the gentry of the neighborhood, yet that 
he was fully convinced that he could not have been satisfied 
with a country living : for, talking of a respectable clergy- 
man in Lincolnshire, the very one, probably, who accepted 
this living after his refusal, he remarked, " This man, sir, 
fills up the duties of his life well. I approve of him, but 
could not imitate him." Yet the prevailing motive was evi- 
dently that stated by him to Sir John Hawkins, for we have 
this noble part of his conversation recorded : " Sir," he said 
to a friend, a lawyer, who thought a clerical life would have 
been easier, " Sir, the life of a parson, of a conscientious cler- 
gyman, is not easy. I have always considered a clergyman 
as the father of a larger family than he is able to maintain. 
I ivould rather have chancery suits upon my hands titan 
the cure of souls. No, sir, I do not envy a clergyman's life 

The above facts bring to mind a letter, lately sold in London to Mr- 
Pocock, which gives evidence of Johnson's poverty in the year 1751. 

" Mr. Johnston — Sr, your wife stands endebted to me for the soume 
of two pounds ever sinces Agust 12th 1749 — wh sume I have caled 
for, and sent after teel lame ashamed, & as it is such a small afair it 
cane distres no man to pay it in a weeks time, wh I hope you wil com- 
ply with or eles you must excuis me proceeding according to Law in 
preventing of which you will oblig yrself and humble Servt. 

"Will Mitchell. 

"Juley 3th, 1751. 
" Star, Shandois Street, 

" Govt Garden." 

[From the Athenaum of July 22, 1848.] 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP 93 

as an easy life, nor do I envy the clergyman who makes it 
an easy life." How would this have pleased good Bishop 
Burnet, who, in his admirable " Pastoral Care," thus speaks 
of the studious part of a clergyman's life, in terms so apropos 
with the above, that they may readily be quoted ; " Let any 
young divine," he says, " go to the chambers of a student in 
the Inns of Court, and see how many books he must read, 
and how great a volume of a commonplace book he must 
make ; he will there see through how hard a task one must 
go in a course of many years, and how ready he must be in 
all the parts of it, before he is called to the bar, or can man- 
age business. How exact must a physician be in anatomy, 
in simples, in pharmacy, in the theory of diseases, and in the 
observations and counsels of doctors, before he can, either with 
honor or a safe conscience, undertake practice ;" and the in- 
ference is plain in regard to the " noblest and most important 
profession of all others," for, as another bishop has said, 
«' It is no slender measure of the knowledge of antiquity, his- 
tory, philology, that is requisite to qualify a man for such an 
undertaking." All this would have been more than master- 
ed by Dr. Johnson, but he felt that he had not the necessary 
love and zeal, and peculiar aptness for a ministry of which 
Bishop Burnet exclaims, " If St. Paul, after all his visions 
and labors, after all his raptures and sufferings, yet was in- 
wardly burnt up with the concerns of the church, and labor- 
ed with much fear and trembling, how much greater appre- 
hensions ought other persons to have of such a trust I" 

And yet who could better draw the model of a pastor, or 
more properly describe what the preaching of the clergy 
should be, than this Dr. Johnson, who honorably refused to 
enter on the ministerial office, because of his own presumed 
unfitness to fulfill the duty in the love of it. His model of a 
clergyman was the Rev. Zachariah Mudge, Prebendary of 
Exeter, M'ho, we are told, was idolized in the west of England, 
both for his excellence as a preacher and the uniform perfect 
propriety of his private character. After telling of the great 
and comprehensive nature of his thought and action, his firm- 
ness, and general benevolence, and pi'ofound learning, Johnson 
proceeds to say, " His discharge of parochial duties was ex- 



94 DR. JOHiNSON'S CHURCHMANSHir. 

emplary. How his sermons were composed, may be learned 
from the excellent volume which he has given to the public ; 
but how they were delivered can be only known to those who 
heard them : for, as he appeared in the pulpit, words will 
not easily describe him. His delivery, though unconstrained, 
was not negligent, and though forcible, was not turbulent : 
disdaining anxious nicety of emphasis, and labored artifice of 
action, it captivated the hearer by its natural dignity : it 
roused the sluggish and fixed the volatile, and detained the 
mind upon the subject without directing it to the speaker." 

The reader of the above truly Johnsonian paragraph will 
not fail to mark its judicious antithesis, and concisely learn 
what should be avoided, and what should be adopted in 
preaching. The main desideratum is naturalness of manner 
and of voice — no "labored artifice of action," but "natural 
dignity" — with the fixing the minds of the hearers on the 
subject, " without directing to the speaker." Alas ! for our 
spiritual pride and idolatry of intellect, how do all good and 
humble men crucify that carnal disposition ! Well saith 
Solomon, " For men to search their own glory is not glory ;"* 
and let us all, laity and clergy alike, remember St. Paul's 
frequent exhortations to lowliness of mind : " Let each esteem 
other better than themselves." One of the ancient fathers 
would frequently weep at the applause that was so often ac- 
corded to his sermons : " Would to God," he said, " they had 
rather gone away silent and thoughtful I" " I love a serious 
preacher," writes Fenelon, " who speaks for my sake, and 
not for his own; who seeks my salvation, and not his own 
vain-glory." " The fame of a godly man," says the sainted 
Baxter, "is as great a snare as the fame of a learned man. 
And woe to him that takes up with the fame of godliness, 
instead of godliness I" Godly simplicity is the alchemy, as 
has been said, that converts every thing it touches into gold. 
" If any man ascend the pulpit," said Kirke White, "with 
the intention of uttering a fine thing, he is committing a 
deadly sin." " Ah, why are dust and ashes proud ?"* ex- 
claims the Rev. John Newton, in reference to this matter. 

* Prov. XXV. 27. 

t Why is earth and ashss proud? — Ecdus. x. 9. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCH MANSHIP. 95 

But those who wish to pursue the subject further, and learn 
true humility of heart in relation to it, should diligently 
peruse Bishop Burnet's " Pastoral Care," and Cowper's sec- 
ond book of his " Task ;" and, after all that can be said and 
written, we may be pretty sure that earnestness is the grand 
secret of pulpit and pastoral success ; as our poet saith of the 
young warrior, 

" Wolfe, where'er he fought, 
Put so much of his heart into his act^ 
That his example had a magnet's force." 

Dr. Johnson does not inform us whether this clergyman's 
preaching was of an extemporaneous nature, but we may, 
from the evident exactnesss and sober seriousness of the print- 
ed discourses, come to the conclusion that they were previous- 
ly written in the study. A good sermon is a good sermon, 
whether written or spoken ; and the question whether sermons 
should be written and read, or be unwritten and spoken with- 
out book, should be left to the ability and prudence of ministers, 
and ever be regarded as a matter of the least importance. 

The pen and the tongue may be equally inspired. Wrongly 
did the Quaker say to Baxter, " You read your sermons out 
of a paper, therefore you have not the Spirit .'" And he 
replied, " It is not want of your abilities that makes ministers 
use notes, but it is a regard to the work, and good of the 
hearers. I use notes as much as any man, ivhen I take 
pains ; and as little as any ynan, ivhen I am lazy, or busy, 
or have not time to prepare. It is easier for us to preach 
three sermons tvithout notes, than one loith the^n." We 
can readily understand this in one who has the gift of fluent 
speech. To such a man, to write a short sermon would be 
a great labor. It is as one said, who wrote a long, rambling 
letter to a friend, " If I had more time, I would have written 
a shorter one." He wrote as he would have spoken; while 
a shorter epistle would have conveyed fully as much intelli- 
gence, but with better arrangement and more perspicuity. 
Few extemporaneous preachers would like to read their ser- 
mons in print, taken down word for word as they were uttered ; 
no, much con-ection would be necessary ; and does not this 
tell us of the superior inspiration attendant on the pen, rather 



96 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

than on the tongue ? There is much mistake on this subject, 
especially among the humbler and more ignorant classes of 
mankind, who look upon an extemporaneous preacher as 
almost necessarily inspired I* What would such persons 
think of four, five, or six hours, of eloquent and glowing de- 
bate from individual members of the Houses of Parliament ? 
Too often the power of public preaching is put down to in- 
spiration, when it is an intellectual gift simply, and mainly 
dependent on the force of the natural memory ; and while 
we reason correctly as regards the speeches of political 
speakers, we believe fanatically concerning the discourses of 
divines. Often an ill sermon, with a multitude of texts flu- 
ently quoted, but wrongly applied will take more (it merits 
no better expression) than a correct and more scriptural dis- 
course. Bishop Stillingfleet complained in his time, " There 
is got an ill habit of speaking extempore, and a loose and 
careless way of talking in the pulpit, which is easy to the 
2)reacher, and plausible to less judicious people." 

Divines differ much on this subject, but, as has been said 
before, it is quite an unimportant one. Bishop Burnet gives 
excellent rules for proficiency in both styles of preaching, and 

* We may read on all sides of great success attendant on the delivery 
of written sermons. Of the celebrated Romaine it is recorded : " Al- 
though he still adhered to the written sermon, he delivered it with 
energy and pathos; and great and small bore testimony to the power 
with which he spake. The Gospel from his mouth appeared to them 
another Gospel from that which they had heard before. His fame 
spread ; multitudes thronged around him ; the church was crowded," 
&c. &c. — Memoirs of the Countess of Huntingdon, vol. i. p. 131. 

The excellent observations of Charles Simeon, in regard to extempo- 
raneous prayer, may aptly be applied to extemporaneous preaching : 
" Now take the prayers," he says, " that are offered on any Sabbath in 
all places out of the Establishment ; have them all written down, and 
every expression sifted and scrutinized as our Liturgy has been ; then 
compare them with the prayers that have been offered in all the 
churches of the kingdom ; and see what comparison the extemporaneous 
effusions will hear icith our prccomposed forms. Having done this for 
one Sabbath, proceed to do it for a year ; and then, after a similar ex- 
amination, compare them again. Were this done, (and done it ought 
to be in order to form a correct judgment on the case), methinks there 
is scarcely a man in the kingdom that ivould not fall down on his knees 
and bless God for the Liturgy of the Established Church.'''' — Simcon^s 
Memoirs, 3d edit p. 216. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 97 

Bishop Mant makes an observation, which, if attended to, 
would at once reconcile all men to the extemporaneous man- 
ner. He says, "Not a sentiment should be conveyed from 
the pulpit to the mind of the hearer, not an expression should 
escape the preacher's lip or fall upon the hearer's ear, which 
could not be justified and maintained in the seclusion of the 
closet, and in the soberness of private conversation." And 
he gives a memorable instance in the case of Bishop Hall, so 
famed for evangelical sweetness: "Never durst I climb," said 
the bishop, " into the pulpit to preach any sermon, whereof I 
had not before, in my poor and plain fashion, penned every 
word in the same order wherein I hoped to deliver it."* 

It was saidf of Bishop Andrew's sermons, " Few of them 
but they passed his hand, and were thrice revised before they 
were preached : and he ever misliked often and loose preach- 
ing, without study of antiquity ; and he would be bold with 
himself, and say, " Whe?i he j^i'sached twice a day at St. 
Giles's, he prated once." Alas I some light and ignorant 
minds would best like the prating. 

The celebrated Charles Simeon, too, used to read his ser- 
mons over and over again, until he could deliver them Math 
great accuracy and ease ; and on one occasion the writer 

* The same degree of reverence should be made use of in the desk. 
Dr. Stonehouse (afterward one of the most correct and elegant preachers 
ill the kingdom) once prevailed upon Garrick to go to church with him. 
After the service, the British Roscius asked the doctor what particular 
business he had to do when the duty was over? "None," said the 
other. " I thought you had," said Garrick, " on seeing you enter the 
reading desk in such a hurry. "Nothing," added lie, "can be more 
indecent than to see a clergyman set about sacred business as if he were 
a tradesman, and go into the church as if he wanted to get out of it as 
soon as possible." He next asked the doctor, " What books he had in 
the desk before him?" " Only the Bible and Pra3'er-book." " Only 
the Bible and Prayer-book !" replied the actor ; " why, you tossed them 
backward and Ibrward, and turned the leaves as carelessly as if they 
were those of a day-book or ledger." — Countess of Huntingdon, vol. i. 
p. 139. The great secret of reading well is to avoid a mock reveren- 
tial tone, and to read in the natural voice ; especially reading the nar- 
rative parts of the Bible as you would read a narrative in any other 
book, desirous of making it understood. 

1" By the Bishop of Ely, in the Funeral Sermon of this " uainiui 
preacher," p. 21. See Soulhey's Commonplace Book, p. 343. 

E 



98 DR. JOH.N'SON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

recollects his complaint of having been so much engaged as 
only to have had time to read his sermon over five times 
previous to delivery. Written sermons are of great antiquity, 
for even some of the fathers preached from book, and the 
written sermon is most suited and acceptable to the staid 
character of the English people, as well as to the more en- 
lightened minds among them ; yet it would be well if the 
extemporaneous manner were also studied, for, if occasionally 
used with efiect, it would go far to disabuse the people of 
the absurd idea, that the preacher of the written sermon is 
not inspired ; and it would also have other salutary uses. A 
venerable and exemplary clergyman once said, " I take care 
to let my people know that I can preach extempore;" and 
it would be well if the clergy generally took this hint ; and 
we must recollect, that much extemporaneous exhortation is 
expected from the clergy in visiting their flocks, as well as 
public speaking in behalf of missionary and other beneficial 
societies. It might, therefore, be a matter worthy the serious 
consideration of churchmen, whether the practice of elocu- 
tion should not form a prominent article in training for the 
Christian ministry — whether professorships at the Universi- 
ties, instituted for this purpose, might not be of essential 
service : and the bishops should think whether they should 
not give every encouragement to its success, by making it a 
prime question in the examination of candidates for ordina- 
tion. With dissenters it is made a sine qua rwn in relation 
to entrance on the ministry ; and this circumstance of being 
surely able to address large bodies of men acceptably, must 
give them, in no mean degree, an advantage ; especially 
since, day by day, oratory is gaining power, and good speak- 
ers, who really set free the riches of a full mind, will more 
readily gain an ascendency for their principles in the hearts 
of mankind at large. 

But to return to our model clergyman. Johnson contin- 
ues : " The grandeur and solemnity of the preacher did not 
intrude upon his general behavior ; at the table of his friends, 
he was a companion communicative and attentive, of un- 
aflccted manners, of manly cheerfulness, willing to please, 
and easy to be pleased. His acquaintance was universally 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 99 

solicited, and his presence obstructed no enjoyment which 
religion did not forbid. Though studious, he was popular ; 
though argumentative, he was modest ; though inflexible, he 
was candid ; though metaphysical, yet orthodox." 

Dr. Johnson Avas a great reader of sermons ; he thoiight 
they made so considerable a branch of English literature, 
that any library would be incomplete without a large col- 
lection of them ; and he was well acquainted with those of 
Hooker, Atterbury, Tillotson, South, Taylor, Sanderson, Sher- 
lock, Jortin, Seed, Smalridge, Ogden, and many others. 

There is one letter of Dr. Johnson's, addressed to a young 
clergyman (probably the Rev. George Strahan, who was with 
him in his last illness), so truly valuable to every pastor, that 
it must be given entire in this place, especially since it con- 
tains some golden rules in the composition of sermons. It 
contains Johnson's maturest judgment on clerical duties, for 
it bears the date of August 30th, 1780. It runs thus : 

"Dear Sik- — Not many days ago. Dr. Lawrence showed 
me a letter, in which you make mention of me ; I hope, 
therefore, you will not be displeased that I endeavor to pre- 
serve your good-will by some observations which your letter 
suggested to me. 

" You are afraid of falling into some improprieties in the 
daily service, by reading to an audience that requires no 
exactness. Your fear, I hope, secures you from danger. 
They who contract absurd habits are such as have no fear. 
It is impossible to do the same thing very often without some 
peculiarity of manner ; but that manner may be good or bad, 
and a little care will at least preserve it from being bad ; to 
make it good, there must, I think, be something of natural 
or casual felicity, which can not be taught. 

" Your present method of making your sermons seems very 
judicious. Few frequent preachers can be supposed to have 
sermons more their own than yours will be. Take care to 
register, somewhere or other, the authors from whom your 
several discourses are borrowed : and do not imagine that 
you shall always remember even what, perhaps you now 
think it impossible to forget. 



LofC. 



100 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCH MANSH II'. 

" My advice, however, is, that you attempt, from time to 
time, an original sermon ; and in the labor of composition, 
do not burden your mind with too much at once ; do not 
exact from yourself at one effort of excogitation propriety of 
thought and elegance of expression. Invent first, and then 
embellish. The production of something, where nothing was 
before, is an act of greater energy than the expansion or dec- 
oration of the thing produced. Set down diligently your 
thoughts as they rise, in the first words that occur ; and 
when you have matter, you will easily give it form ; nor, per- 
haps, will this method be always necessary, for, by habit, 
your thoughts and diction will flow together. 

"The composition of sermons is not very difficult; the 
divisions not only help the memory of the hearer, but direct the 
judgment of the writer ; they supply sources of invention, and 
keep every part in its proper place." 

Dr. Johnson's advice to young clergymen on the composi- 
tion of sermons, is just that of the most judicious divines, as 
given in their several charges and instructions to the clergy. 
Burnet would much rather recommend the using other men's 
sermons, than the making any of their own, where they are 
not masters of the body of Divinity, and of the Scriptures. 
He thinks it an unreasonable piece of vanity for men to ofier 
their own crudities, when such excellent discourses are to be 
obtained in print : at the same time he hopes, that from 
copying good models, ere long they may "be able to go with- 
out such crutches, and to work without patterns." Bishop 
Bull also advises young ministers not at first to trust to their 
own compositions, but to furnish themselves with a store of 
the best sermons that have been published by the learned 
divines of the Church, with the view of ultimately attaining 
to a good habit of writing themselves. On the other hand. 
Bishop Sprat (1695) commences a charge with an admoni- 
tion, which he declares he is almost ashajned to give : " The 
caution," to use his exact words, "in plain terras, is this; 
that every persoii Avho undertakes this great employment, 
should make it a matter of religion and conscience, to j)?'each 
nothing but wltat is the product of his oivii. study, and of 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 101 

his oivn conijwsing" George Herbert says, "Though the 
world is full of such composures" (excellent sermons), " yet 
every maris own is fittest, readiest, and most savory to him.'' 
Bishop Mant strongly recommends the clergy, for several 
sufficient reasons, to practice the composition of sermons, as 
most advantageous to themselves, and to those to whom they 
preach. "The country parson," writes Herbert, " preacheth 
constantly ; the pulpit is his joy and his throne ;" and hardly 
could this dehght be consistent with other than preaching his 
own discourses. And again, the complexion of the sermon 
suiteth ; for, he says, " the character of his sermon is holiness ; 
he is not witty, or learned, or eloquent, but holy." On the 
whole, although no minister should in this case peremptorily 
deny himself the aid and use of other men's discourses, yet 
we may think it most necessary that he should exercise his 
own abilities in carrying out his ordination vow, to " teach 
the people committed to his care and charge ; " and although 
at first he may advisedly desire help, and his own modesty 
may influence him in this, yet, if there be no prospect of his 
being able to do these things of himself — if neither his own 
love of composition, nor his possession of abilities, urge him — 
then we may very reasonably ask. What business has he in 
the ministerial office at all, seeing that preaching is a princi- 
pal part of it? Is he always to be an indolent copyist, a 
mere retailer of other men's goods ; a sapless, lifeless tree in 
regard to this spiritual bearing of fruit? Surely all our noble 
divines would condemn such a man in such a course ; the 
people at large would discern his incapacity and unfaithful- 
ness ; and, most of all, Avould the man, if any right feeling be 
in him, utterly, hoAvever secretly, condemn himself : for in no 
other profession would such a course be tolerated, or be hon- 
orably undertaken, 

Dr. Johnson proceeds in his admirable letter : 

"What I like least in your letter is your account of the 
manners of your parish ; JVom which I gather, that it has 
been long neglected by the parson. The Dean of Carlisle 
(Dr. Percy), who was then a little rector in Northampton- 
shire, told me, that it might be discerned whether or no there 



102 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

was a clergyman resident in a parish, by the civil or savage 
manner of the people. Such a congregation as yours stands 
in need of much reformation, and I M'ould not have you think 
it impossible to reform them. A very savage parish was 
civilized by a decayed gentlewoman, who came among them 
to teach a petty school. My learned friend, Dr. Wheeler, of 
Oxford, when he was a young man, had the care of a neigh- 
boring parish for fifteen pounds a year, which he was never 
paid ; but he counted it a convenience, that it compelled him 
to make a sermon weekly. One woman he could not bring 
to the communion ; and when he reproved or exhorted her, 
she only answered, that she was no scholar. He was advised 
to set some good woman or man of the parish, a little wiser 
than herself, to talk to her in a language level to her mind. 
Such honest, I may call them holy artifices, must be practiced 
by every clergyman, for all means must be tried by which 
souls may be saved. Talk to your people, however, as much 
as you can ; and you will find, that the moi'e frequently you 
converse with them upon religious subjects, the more willing- 
ly they will attend, and the more submissively they will 
learn. A clergyman's diligence alivays makes him 'venera- 
ble. I think I have now only to say, that, in the moment- 
ous work you have undertaken, I pray God to bless you. 

"I am, sir, &c., 

"Sam. Johnson." 

In reading the above, we think of Hannah More and her 
schools at Mendip, albeit she was no decayed gentlewoman ; 
and the " holy artifice " brings to our minds the " catching 
with guile" of St Paul.* And what is of more service than 
a continued system of parochial visiting ? what wins the hearts 
of the poor more ? what better than a grave and judicious 
talking to the people ? not religious gossip — not cant — ^not 
light observations — but sober and reasonable discourse, warn- 
ing, rebuking, instructing, comforting. The poor treasure up 
the sayings of their minister, and a word in season may be 
worth many sermons, which persons take not to themselves : 

* 1 Cor. xii. 16. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 103 

and well do I remember the praise which a farmer accorded 
to an active and pious country clergyman : " Sir," said he, 
"that was the first gentleman that ever came and talked 
with us, and he would walk hy the side of the men when at 
plow, speaking to them on the -welfare of their souls. He 
has always been the same man, and so we all love him." 
This was spoken of an aged pastor, of one who had minis- 
tered in the same parish for upward of forty years — the 
same good man all the while, whose motto might well have 
been taken from Johnson, " Talk to your people." Happy 
are those clergymen who can exercise the privilege of talking 
to all their people ; for, alas ! our church too often places 
one man amid thousands, and still expects his ministry to be 
not only sufficient, but successful. Rightly did Dr. John- 
son remark, " That a London parish was a very comfortless 
thing, for the clergyman seldom knew the face of one out of 
ten of his parishioners ;" and what would he now say to the 
cases which the large manufacturing towns present ? 

It may be mentioned, that he was a great advocate of 
plain preaching, and thought that the established clergy did 
not preach plain enough ; for " polished periods and glitter- 
ing sentences flew over the heads of the common people with- 
out any impression upon their hearts." He thought the 
adoption of a plain and familiar style, the only way of doing 
good to the common people, and which "clergymen of genius 
and learning ought to do from a principle of duty, when it is 
suited to their congregations : a practice for which they will 
be praised by men of sense." And thus, for example, "to 
insist against drunkenness as a crime, because it debases 
i-eason, the noblest faculty of man, would be of no service 
to the common people ; but to tell them they may die in a 
fit of drunkenness, and show them how dreadful that would 
be, can not fail to make a deep impression ;" of course, backed 
by the awful truth, that a drunkard caji not inherit the 
kingdoin of God. And he added, to Boswell, " Sir, when 
your Scotch clergy give up their homely manner, religion 
will soon decay in that country." 

In looking on the above remarks, we must recollect that 
Johnson is speaking in a less educated age than the present ; 



104 DR. JOHiNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

an age prolific of more great men, but in which knowledge 
was not so generally diffused. He thought that the Meth- 
odists had the advantage in plain speaking, but now we find 
tlie Methodist preacher to be lagging in the rear of the 
schoolmaster, and that a more educated flock requires a 
higher tone of preaching, and would be more capable of 
appreciating the more refined style of argument, as rejected 
by Johnson in the case of drunkenness. Baxter, we are told, 
always contrived that some part of his sermon should be 
above the comprehension of the mass of his heai'ers. On 
the other hand, Bishop Burnet says, " A preacher is to fancy 
himself as in the room of the most unlearned man in his 
whole parish." There is a way, however, of making the 
same discourse perfectly acceptable both to rich and poor, 
learned and unlearned ; and, indeed, the rich and learned 
often most loathe fine sermons. It is said that the present 
rector of St. Giles's (the Rev. J. Endell Tyler) was pre- 
sented to that preferment by the late Lord Liverpool, when 
Prime Minister, because he was a plain and instructive 
preacher : his lordship intimating that his time was so occu- 
pied, that when he went to church, he wished not to sit and 
listen to argumentative and learned discourses, but to be in- 
formed, as clearly as possible, on all the leading essentials, 
both in faith and practice, of our most holy religion. Many 
a fine preacher displayed his eloquence before the Prime 
Minister of the Crown, but the plain one succeeded in best 
winning his approbation and regard. 

Johnson was a great supporter of the liberty of the pulpit, 
and his defense of the P^ev. James Thompson, minister of 
Dunfermline, will amply reward perusal. When it was 
read to Burke, he was highly pleased, and exclaimed, "Well, 
he does his work in a workman-like manner." The counsel 
of Jeremy Taylor may generally be the best to be observed : 
" Spare no man's sin, but meddle with no man's person ; 
neither name any man, or make him to be suspected — he 
that doth otherwise, makes his sermon to be a libel ;" and 
Dr. Johnson argues, " A minister who has in his congrega- 
tion a man of open and scandalous wickedness, may warn his 
parishioners to shun his conversation. To warn them is not 



DR. JOHNSON'S CIIURCHMANSHIP. 105 

only lawful, but not to warn them would be criminal. He 
may warn them one by one in friendly converse, or by a 
parochial visitation. But if he may warn each man singly, 

what should forbid him to warn them all together ? 

And of a sudden and solemn publication the impression is 
deeper, and the warning more effectual." Hear an Apostle: 
Thetn that sin (probably signifying the people* rather than 
the presbyters, of whom he was speaking) rebuke before all, 
that others also may fear ; and Titus also was to rebuke 
all classes of the people %nth all a2tthority : certainly the 
former text carries with it a personal application. 

We have seen Johnson deliberately refusing to undertake 
the ministei'ial office, when offered to him under tempting 
circumstances ; and we have seen that he understood well 
the nature of a clergyman's duties. In other ways in al- 
lusion to clerical conduct, we find him making admirable 
observations. On one occasion, some clergymen in his com- 
pany carried convivial joviality to excess, thinking all the 
while that he would be entertained. But Johnson sat silent 
and grave for some time : at last, turning to Beauclerk, he 
said, by no means in a tvhisper, "This merriment of parsons 
is mighty offensive." Sir Walter Scott tells us of a minis- 
ter, who held a high character as a leader of the strict and 
rigid Presbyterian party in the Church of Scotland, yet was 
remarkable for the way he shone in convivial society. "He 
"was ever gay amid the gayest :" when it once occurred to 
some one present to ask, what one of his elders would think, 
should he see his pastor in such a merry mood. " Think," 
replied the doctor ; " why, he would not believe his own 
eyes." 

In the case of " believing one's own eyes," refinedly called 
" ocular demonstration," there is an anecdote told of the late 
Rev. Rowland Hill. Late on one evening he ordered his 
carriage, and bade his coachman drive him to Drury-lane 

* 1 Tim. V. 20. " It is not agreed," observes Bloomfield, " whether 
the presbyters, or the people at large, are here to be understood. The 
context favors the former view ; but the air of the sentence, and the 
change of number, rather require the latter." Notes on the Greek Tes- 
tament, by the Rev. S. T. Bloomfield, D. D., F. S. A., vol. ii. p. 427. 

E* 



106 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

theatre. The man stared, hesitated, thought his master 
mad ; but " To the theatre .'" was the authoritative com- 
mand. Down he was set at the theatre, and, to his coach- 
man's utter bewilderment, purchased a ticket, and walked 
in. Rowland Hill entered a box, fixed his eyes sternly on 
its occupant, exclaiming, " Oh, you are there, are you I" 
and abruptly quitting the theatre, drove home. The poor 
and almost petrified occupant was a preacher at his own 
chapel, who had been reported to him as a frequenter of the 
theatre, but which report he would not credit, until " seeing 
was believing" to him. 

That the rebuker should have clean hands is an important 
consideration in the value of a rebuke. In the above case 
we may imagine it was indeed withering I But a story is 
told in a hunting county, in which a clergyman delivered 
himself by his ready wit. A venerable archdeacon, who had 
heard of this clergyman's hunting propensities, sent for him 
to lecture him on the subject. Soundly did he administer 
his rebuke, long Avas he about it, while his poor victim spake 
not a word in his defense. Suddenly the archdeacon per- 
ceiving a smile on the culprit's countenance, said, " Ah I I 
see my admonition has little efiect upon you : alas I you too 
much resemble Gallio in the Scriptures, who cared not for 
these things." Now was the climax; and the expected 
penitent, drawing himself up to his full height, and fixing a 
wickedly merry eye on his reverend elder, replied, " Mr. 
Archdeacon, I have heard you with patience : you may have 
rebuked me rightly, and I may be a Gallio ; but this I have 
to say, that if I am a Gallio, your son Richard is a Tally- 
ho ; and so, Mr. Archdeacon, I wish you a very good morn- 
ing." The son Richard was a noted clerical fox-hunter ! 

Nevertheless, a sporting parson is an abomination, and, 
let us hope, nearly an extinct one. Let a clergyman be 
given to sporting, or let his " talk be of bullocks," and every 
one feels that he is out of his proper element : for to him, 
with what propriety may 

" The master of the pack 
Cry, 'Well done, saint!' and clap hina on the back."* 

* Cowper. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCIIMANSHIP. 107 

No sermons that he may preach, no amount of ahns that he 
may give, no moral rectitude in temporal things, M'ill ever 
lead the people (however they may partially disguise it in his 
presence) to look upon him with reverence, or to regard and 
love him in their hearts as a pastor that is doing his duty to 
the church, and is sufficiently not minding earthly things. 
If such a one would considerately listen to the poorer mem- 
bers ot' the flock honestly and reasonably speaking their 
minds in this matter, he would neither mount the hunter 
nor carry the gun for one hour more ; for, if he had a heart, 
such comments would subdue its love of that which prevents 
his spiritual visitings of the sick, the ignorant, and the 
afflicted, and makes more dissenters from the Apostolic 
church than any other cause. Bishop Mant, and many 
other prelates, have loudly spoken against it ; and all may 
ask, With what propriety can a clergyman enter a cottage 
to pray with its afflicted inhabitant, and leave his gun and 
dogs at the door, or stop in the exciting career of a fox-hunt- 
ing chase ? It is perfectly true, there is no sin in either of 
these amusements, if the sin of cruelty can be separated 
from them ; but as Bishop Gibson observes, " the laws of 
the church have in all ages restrained clergymen from many 
freedoms and divei'sions, which in others are accounted al- 
lowable and innocent ; being such exercises as are too 
eager and violent, and therefore unagreeable to that sedate- 
ness and gravity which becomes our functions," &c. John- 
son used to say, that the reason a man found pleasure in 
hunting was, because he " feels his own vacuity less in 
action than when at rest ;" but surely a well disciplined 
and cultivated mind never knows what vacuity is, and 
would least of all resort, for its cure, to violent locomotion 
of the body. Sir Joshua Reynolds observed, that " the real 
character of a man was found out by his amusements." 
Boswell makes a good remark, to the effect, that if the clergy 
knew how much an indiscriminate mixing in the pleasures 
of society " lessens them in the eyes of those whom they 
think to please by it, they would feel themselves much 
mortified." 

Dr. Johnson always thought that a due .solemnity and 



103 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

propriety of manner was to be expected from bishops, and a 
corresponding respect paid to their office and venerable char- 
acter.* It Avould not be immoral in a bishop, he said, "to 
whip a top in Grosvenor-square ; but, if he did, I hope the 
boys would fall upon him, and apply the whip to him. 
There are gradations in conduct ; there is morality, decency, 
propriety. None of these should be violated by a bishop." 
He also disapproved of bishops giving dinners during Passion- 
week, or going to routs ; at least, of their staying at these 
latter longer than their presence commanded respect. In 
talking on this point, Boswell happily observed, " When a 
bishop places himself in a situation where he has no distinct 
character, and is of no consequence,^ he degrades the dignity 
of his order :" on wliich Johnson remarked to Mrs. Thrale, 
"Mr. Boswell, madam, has said it as correctly as it could 
be." Not only in the dignitaries of the church, but in the 
clergy generally, Dr. Johnson looked for a particular decorum 
and delicacy of behavior, with more seriousness than others 
of mankind, and a suitable composure of manners. At the 
same time, it must be told to the laity, that there is not a 
higher standard laid down in the Scriptures for the clergy 
than for themselves ; and the good pattern of ministers is 
not one which they are to look upon and admire only, but to 
follow. 



* How truly does the celebrated Cheshire petition, presented by Sir 
Thomas Ashton in the House of Lords commence ; '" When we con- 
sider that bishops were instituted in the times of the Apostles ; that they 
were the great lights of the church in all the first General Councils ; 
that so many of them sowed the seeds of religion in their blood, and 
rescued Christianity from utter extirpation in the primitive heathen per- 
secutions ; that to them we owe the redemption of the purity of the 
Gospel we now profess from Romish corruption ; that many of them, for 
the propagation of the truth, became such glorious martyrs.'''' &c. &c. ; to 
pray the present removal of them we can not conceive to relish of jus- 
tice or charity, nor can we join with them."' — Nalson, vol. ii. p. 759. 
From Southey's Commonplace Book, p. 39. 

The petitioners go on to the state, that in lieu of twenty-six Ordina- 
ries, "easily responsible to parliaments,'" they fear to become exposed 
to the " mere arbitrary government of a numerous Presbytery, who, 
together with their Ruling Elders, will arise to nearly forty thousand 
Church govc}-nors.'^ 



CHAPTER IX. 

HIS CHURCH MANSHI P. 

Other, points in Dr. Johnson's churchraanship demand our 
attention. It is certain, that the Scriptures invest places 
erected for the worship of the Supreme Being with a peculiar 
sacredness. No one can read the eighth chapter of the first 
Book of Kings, and also think of the Shechinah, and not 
acknowledge this. It is proper, too, that our churches should 
be built after a peculiar pattern in architecture, and manifest 
by their outward and inward appearance that they are set 
apart for the duties of religion only. They should also be 
made more comfortable, so that the cold and dampness may 
not be inconvenient to the body when engaged in devotion, 
especially to feeble or aged persons. Perhaps it would be 
highly advantageous, if popular prejudice would so far relax 
as to allow pictures to reappear on the walls of our churches ; 
we have them in the windows, why not on the walls ? Great 
instruction is derived from pictures ; we teach children by 
them ; we can in many things more readily give an adult 
an idea of a building, a man, a scene, by showing him a 
picture, than by using thousands of words. We have sacred 
pictures in our houses, and we worship them not ; can it for 
a moment be imagined that they would be worshiped in 
churches ? Are we not afraid, where no fear is ? alarmed 
at a shadow, a senseless echo, a nonentity ? Suppose the 
richer of the laity would transfer some of their beautiful pic- 
tures from the walls of their mansions to those of the church, 
(and in this we should have the sanction of Luther), not only 
would churches become the conservatories of the best speci- 
mens of the art of painting, as well as of architecture or 
sculpture, but the people would reap the advantage of having 
their churches made more comfortable, inasmuch as the 



110 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

church must be kept aired and dry for the sake of the pres- 
ervation of the pictures : churches would not then be left to 
the tender mercies and tastes of churchwardens. Yet, with 
the cherished idea of a church as a place of peculiar scanc- 
tity, and to be adorned with every decent allurement to devo- 
tion, we need not object to Dr. Johnson's reasoning, when he 
says, " We may allow fancy to suggest certain ideas in cer- 
tain places, but reason must always be heard, when she tells 
us, that those ideas and those places have no natural or neces- 
sary rejation. When we enter a church, %ve habitually re- 
call to mind the duty of adoration, hut ice t}tust not omit 
adoration for want of a temjjle ; because we know, and 
ought to remember, that the universal Lord is every where 
present ; and that, therefore, to come to lona, or to Jerusalem, 
though it may he iiseful, can not he necessary T 

How wise is this ; what a happy moderation on a mat- 
ter which runs away with weak or superstitious minds ! 
We need not be of those who would be followers of Mrs. 
Adams, when she told Parson Adams that religion should 
not be talked of out of church ; yet, if we can ornament a 
church, and by doing so pi'oduce a substantial benefit, we 
ought at once to consider how it can be worthily accomplish- 
ed. Dr. Johnson loved to cherish a feeling of veneration. 
" I look," he said, " with reverence upon every place that has 
been set apart for religion," although he spake of a chapel m 
ruins ; and he kept off^ his hat while he was within its walls. 
Nor may this feeling be without its practical effect, for, after 
having visited the cathedral on the island of Icolmkill, Bos- 
well, who was a Presbyterian, writes, " I hoped that ever 
after having been in this holy place, I should maintain an 
exemplary conduct." 

Dr. Johnson thought it proper to observe the holy days of 
the church. Some one having objected to the "observance 
of days, and months, and years" (Gal. iv. 10, signifying 
Jewish days, months, &c., napaTrjpelode, siqjerstitioudy ob- 
serve), he answered, " The church does not superstitiously 
observe days, merely as days, but as rflemorials of important 
facts." At another time he remarked to Boswell, " Sir, the 
holy-days observed by our church are of great use in religion." 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. Ill 

So tiiought Patrick, Hooker, Taylor,* Hammond, Tillotson, 
and other pious divines of the Church of England. 

Let us ponder a little on this subject. The number of 
the holy-days of the Church of England is not grievous. The 
political economist need not dread their usurpation on the 
labors which build up his mammon. They are not those al- 
luded to by Bishop Horsley in the ordinance of Bishop Niger, 
as ratified by Nicholas the Fifth (in the reign of Henry the 
Sixth), after the interpretation by Archbishop Arundel and 
Innocent the Seventh — neither in the former provincial con- 
stitution of Archbishop Islip — but simply and only those 
days which have, peculiar reference to our Lord himself, to 
the Holy Spirit, and to Apostles and Evangelists. These, 
which include Christmas Day, Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, 
Easter Monday and Tuesday, and Whit-Monday and Tues- 
day, will be just thirty days in the year, and in every year 
some of these holy-days will occur on the Sunday. We speak 
of the Saints' days of the church, but it must be recollected 
that it is only of the New Testament saints that we speak ; 
and, certainly, if persons would attend the church service, 
and listen to the appropriate lessons, they would gain such a 
knowledge of these scriptural patterns, as would be, in John- 
son's words, "of great use in religion." Well do our people 
know that the Saint above all saints is Jesus CnpasT, and 
that all the holy saints put together have but touched the 
hem of his garment I yet, he who despises an earthly saint, 
will surely never have honored Christ, because he who de- 
spises a lesser degree of any thing, must confessedly despise 
the greater. If a man love the Lord Jesus, he will love 
the genuine light of the Lord, wherever it may be seen, and 
thus will love the least of the saints, as showing forth even a 
spark of the radiance of the Saint of saints ; and how much 
more will he love to hear of those whose lives are bound up 
with the life of our blessed Lord I 

There are some other days which can not be called, strict- 
ly, Saints' days or Festivals of the church, because they are 
only locally observed — the wakes, or feast-days, of the differ- 

* See Rules and Advices to the Clergy, by Jeremy Taylor, 



113 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

ent parishes. The true account of their origin may be best 
derived from Dugdale;* and it appears, in regard (according 
to heathen custom) that many oxen used to be sacrificed to 
devils, some solemnity (ou the introduction of Christianity) 
ought to be allowed in lieu thereof; and on the day of the 
dedication, or festivals of those saints M^hose relics were placed 
there, they were to set up tents about the temples converted 
into churches, and celebrate the solemnity with religious 
feasting, so that beasts should not be sacrificed to the devil, 
hilt slain to be eaten, praising God. - This is the plain insti- 
tution of wakes, which, at one time, were eminently religious 
services, but now universally abused in their observance. Of 
holy-days in general, as da3''s of leisure and recreation, thei'e 
is great difference of opinion ; and we must all allow that a 
holy-day, to be a blessing, and not a curse, must be well 
superintended and well spent. " They reproach the Catholic 
religion," writes Southey, "with the number of its holy- 
days, never considering how the want of holy-days breaks 
down and brutalizes the laboring class, and that loliere they 
occur seldom, they are uniformly abused f' and Lord John 
Manners, a vigorous supporter of the recreations of the poorer 
classes, says, " The abuse springs from the non-use." On 
the other hand, we find these holy-days turned to evil pur- 
poses when the using of them was frequent. Prior to the 
Reformation we find the Abbot of Ely and his clergy going 
forth, in regard to these festivals, to exhort the people " to 
pray devoutly, and not betake themselves to drinking and 
debauchery." Bishop Patrick alludes, in quotation from one 
of the Fathers, to men getting drunk on the tomb-stones of 
the saints. And by an Act of Convocation, passed by Henry 
the Eighth, in the year 1536, their numbers were diminished, 
the feast of every church being ordered to be kept upon one 
and the same day every where : this Act was repealed in 
the time of Charles the First, and wakes were further en- 
couraged by Charles the Second. It is certain there is no 
improvement in them now ; neither, as yet, can an English- 
man, generally speaking, keep a holy-day of any kind in a 

* Letter from Pope Gregory to Mellitus, Bishop of London. Dug- 
dale's Monasticon, vol. ii. p. 323. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 113 

rational manner : the doing so must be the work of time, 
and brought about by the fruits of education. 

But this, Hke too many other matters, is made a money 
question. Wages are so scantly given, that the laborer does 
not desire the keeping of a holy-day, unless his wages are 
continued to him. Formerly an Act of Parliament was passed 
(6th Henry VI.) to order this. Where laborers are hired by 
the year, they should be treated as servants of the year, and 
not of the day : but many are hired only by the week or 
day, and in these cases it would be difficult, by a legislative 
enactment, to guard the poor man. This shows more and 
more, that before the holy-days of the church, can be uni- 
versally kept, there must be a liberal and pious spirit abroad; 
and the farmer's pride should be, to see his laborers more 
contented, more grateful, and 'more cheerfully working on 
their days of work, through having a day of change and leis- 
ure allowed them, somewhat more than one day in seven 
gives them. 

The incapability of rightly observing holy-days certainly 
argues a depravity of manners. These pious days, as well 
as the sacred seasons of Christmas, Easter, and Whitsimtide, 
have been miserably perverted from the sacred intention of 
the primitive institutions, while the other saints' days in the 
Calendar have been allowed to pass by in cold indifference 
and utter neglect. Surely national and individual piety has 
been sorely wounded by such a course, and much devotional 
feeling and sacred affection gone away from the once warmer 
and kinder hearts and minds of the community at large. It 
is gratifying that the church still keeps up her festivals and 
saints' days in great degree ; and if old John Chrysostora 
were to walk into one of our parish churches on Christmas- 
day, he would still find this " metropolis of days," as he call- 
ed it, kept, as in his own time, with prayer, sermon, and 
sacrament : and though he would be among the present 
Christians something like Caractacus among modern Britons, 
yet he would probably find much that would gratify his 
mind and rejoice his heart. 

But if we can not obtain days of recreation for the humbler 
classes, when squire and laborer may, at least in rural dis- 



114 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMxVNSHIP. 

tricts, mingle harmlessly together, the former maintaining such 
a character as our poet Wordsworth writes of one in time past, 

"Rich in love 
And sweet humanity, he was himself 
To the degree that he desired, beloved," 

Still, may not leave to attend on the services of the church 
be obtained ? In good George Herbert's days we learn that 
the plowmen, on hearing the tinkle of his church bell, used 
to tie up their horses, and proceed at once to prayers in his 
church. And may it not be ofiered as a suggestion, whether 
it would not be desirable that the church should order special 
prayers for such days, different to those used on Sundays ? and 
indeed, we may enlarge the question, and ask whether it 
would not be desirable that there should be different prayers 
for every day in the week — specially with a growing desire 
to carry into practice the church's theory of daily prayer ? 
Some persons may be alarmed at the idea of such change, 
and ask. Are not our wants every day the same, and to be 
satisfied by the same petitions ? are not our prayers excel- 
lent ? Yes, this may be true, but we must recollect that 
sameness is not pleasing to the human mind : and that a 
bad effect is likely to be produced on minister and people by 
the daily repetition of the same prayers ; for they will prob- 
ably lose their efiect, and lead to formality. We may greatly 
admire one of Shakspeare's nobler plays, and yet if that 
same play were read to us every day, we should become 
wearied in the hearing of it. And what beautiful and fer- 
vent prayers might the church select from the ancient times I 
and with this advantage, that many of them might be so 
arranged as to be serviceable for domestic as well as public 
use ; and this is a want which the American Book of Com- 
mon Prayer does not overlook. Let vis hope these things 
may meet with attention in the higher quarters : and, mean- 
while, let us be thankful, that the regret of the Scotch Pres- 
byterian Boswell need not be ours, when he observes, " I am 
sorry to have it to say, that Scotland is the;^ only country, 
Catholic or Protestant, where the great events of our religion 
are not solemnly commemorated by its ecclesiastical Establish- 
ment on days set apart for tho purpose." 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 115 

Johnson observed the days of Passion Week with much 
humiUty and reverence, always fasting strictly on Good Fri- 
day. His remarks on the solemn nature of this period of the 
year given in the "Rambler," will be well remembered by 
those who have once perused them. There was a time in 
his literary life, when he was compelled to fast through pov- 
erty, passing two days at a time without any solid food. 

Boswell once said to him, as an instance of the strange 
opinions some persons would ascribe to him, " David Hume 
told me, you said that you would stand before a battery of 
cannon to restore the Convocation to its full powers." With 
a determined look, he thundered forth, '=And would I not, sir? 
Shall the Presbyterian kirk of Scotland have its General 
Assembly, and the Church of England be denied its Convo- 
cation ?" Boswell calls this, but why we may hardly discern, 
an explosion of high-church zeal : at all events, at the present 
time what may be designated the low-church party would 
probably prevail in Convocation. 

The Church of Scotland certainly has its General Assem- 
bly : the Episcopal Church in America, because separated 
from the state, necessarily has its Convention : the Wes- 
leyans in England hold their Conference, and on most absolute 
terms : other bodies of dissenters are governed by something 
analogous — but still (and be it spoken with all deference to 
an opposite opinion of others), it is not advisable that the 
Church of England, and mainly on account of her power, 
should be allowed to revive her Convocation. It must be 
remembered that the bishops, in mixing with the laity in the 
Upper House of Parliament, are following the more ancient 
system, when in the Grand Council of the nation, the Witena- 
gemote, met earls and thanes, bishops and mitred abbots : and 
that at a much later period divines sat in a separate house, 
and thus commenced Convocation. It was in the year 1725 
that Convocation was discontinued, at a time when much ve- 
nality, corruption, avarice, and profligacy marked the times; 
and hence it was disagreeable to the government that the 
morals of the people should be inspected, and decency and 
dignity in the church too rigidly maintained. Their disputes 
in controversial and other matters were assigned as the cause 



116 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

of this authoritative measure : aud if so, it were well ; for 
we can hardly agree with the historian,* that "nothing can 
be more impolitic in a state than to hinder the clergy from 
disputing with each other;" and that, "if religion be not 
kept awake by opposition, it sinks into silence, and no longer 
continues an object of public concern." On the contrary, 
much infidelity, and much immorality, are the consequence 
of the miserable divisions and disputes in the religious com- 
munity ; and religion is most at its height, most attractive 
and most powerful, in proportion as peace and love bear sway 
in public assemblies, and in the private conduct of individuals. 
It was so in the first centuries of the Christian church, when 
no secession from the one and entire body of Christians was 
known : and when the heathen world exclaimed, " See how 
these Christians love one another I" We must recollect that 
Convocation now would be a ditrerent matter to what it has 
hitherto been, inasmuch as multitudes of persons can read 
who before could not; the means of conveying intelligence 
are multiplied; and thus a whole nation would be standing 
on tiptoe to learn every word spoken in the Houses, where 
before but a portion of it could know any tiling about it. 
Of course, newspapers would be established for the purpose 
of making every speech and matter public, and probably the 
debates in Convocation would exceed in interest the debates 
in Parliament : vi^hile a love of taking one side or another in 
exciting controversial topics would rather tend to place in the 
background the humble practice of true religion. We may 
be sure such a stir would arise in the church as would add 
greatly to her convenience or inconvenience : most probably 
to the latter, and, therefore, it may be best to continue the 
church under the guidance of the state, that is, in the power 
of the laity as elected by tke people. Still, it is a very grave 
question, whether dissenting members of Parliament should 
(or could conscientiously) vote on matters aflecting the church, 
because the church should be governed by churchmen : and, 
at all events, the state should Ibrbear to act in a tyrannical 
and overbearing spirit toward the church, so long as she con- 
sents to place her affairs so much under its rules, and declines 
* Goldsmith, vol. iv. p. 263. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 117 

the voice of a separate assembly to express or conduct the 
administration of her aliairs, she seems by so doing to seek 
peace in preference to power. 

But, say many, We want discipline in the church. Well, 
the state has given you much discipline, especially of late, 
through Acts of Parliament; and recollect that laity and 
clergy combined are the church. Yes, but still, they say, the 
church wants the power of excommunication left her by her 
Lord (John xx. 22, 23), and exercised by Apostles and the 
Primitive Church ; for since the church is really a society, 
and yet has none of that outward coercive power wherewith 
the civil magistrate enforces his laws, it is fit she should have 
something in lieu of it, whereby her members might either 
be kept to rule, or else be disowned by her, and excluded from 
all further correspondence or communion with her. Heason 
alone will suggest, that the church, as a society instituted by 
Christ, should have the powers necessary to her support and 
government ; that she should have somewhat wherewith to 
keep her members within the rules and orders of her Founder. 
For it were absurd to suppose of so wise a Founder, that He 
should have left her in such a naked and destitute condition 
as to have no rules of government, no bands of union between 
her members, no common ligaments wherewith to keep the 
body compact, and to preserve it in health and vigor.* Be- 
yond all dispute the church has scriptural authority for the 
enforcement of discipline ; it is a legacy left to the church by 
Christ himself.f And noble is St. Cyprian's praise of the 
exercise of discipline, when he ascribes to it the " preservation 
of our faith and hope : our guidance to heaven : the increase 
of all good dispositions in us : the support of all virtue : our 
abiding in God and Christ, and our partaking at last of their 
blessed promises." Well might he add, that "to adhere to 
it was beneficial: and to despise, or neglect it, fatal." 

No one can deny that the bishops of our church are en- 
abled to exercise much authoritative discipline in gross cases 
of wrong teaching or example, and in relation to moral cou- 

* Marshall on the Penitential Discipline of the Church. 
t See Bishop Jewell's jlpology of the Church of England, on the 
meaning ol" " btailing" and '"loosing." p. 23-27. 



118 DR. JOHiNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

duct, in the case of the clergy. But the popular cry is, that 
persons of the laity call themselves members of the church, 
and are even communicants, and yet of unholy lives. Well, 
the rubric provides for such cases as this latter, although w^e 
certainly want a correct definition given of the persons to 
whom the sacrament of the Lord's Supper is to be refused. 
The revival of such discipline is " too weighty for the shoul- 
ders of any private priest," and, moreover, he might be charg- 
ed with pique or personal dislike. At present, it is rather 
the custom of the clergy, when they see any reprobate persons 
intending to partake of the Sacrament, to send them a private 
note, or confidential message, and thus kindly warn them. 
Yet a great object of all discipline is missed by this private 
proceeding. Happy is it when a man's conscience can de- 
cide the matter for him, as Clemens Aiexandrinus rather 
advises that the people should be left to it in this momentous 
concern: "Some," he says, in commendation rather of the 
practice, " after the customary division of the Eucharistical 
elements, leave it upon the conscience of their people whether 
they will take their part or not. And the best rule to de- 
termine them, in their participation or forbearance," he ob- 
serves to be " their own conscience ; as the surest foundation 
for conscience to proceed upon in this matter was a good life, 
joined with a suitable measure of proficiency in the knowledge 
of the Gospel."* But the boldly speaking St. Chrysostom, 
a kind of Latimer in such respects, tells the clergy, that " it 
is no small penalty which they shall incur, if they suffer any 
to partake of the Holy Table, whom they know to be guilty 
of deadly sin ; and that the blood of suck shall be required 
at their liands ; that therefore, if any general of an army, 
or a consul, or even the emperor himself should offer to ap- 
proach under such circumstances, they were boldly to oppose 
his admission, as beitig vested for such purposes with a 
power superior to any earthly j}otc?itatcs."f After all, 
public opinion must be prepared to second the enforcement of 
discipline, or it would much lose its effect : and dissenters, 

* Clem. Alexand. Stromat. lib. i. vol. i. p. 318. 
t Chrysostom in Matt. xxvi. Homily, No. S3, vol. vii. p. 789. 
Ell. Beaed. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHxMANSHIP. 119 

who would too readily take into their communion the ban- 
ished ones from the church, should not be forward to cry out 
for that which they really in great measure prevent. " The 
absence of discipline," writes Dr. Arnold, " is a most grievous 
evil ; and there is no doubt that although it must be vain 
when opposed to public opinion., yet, when it is the expres- 
sion of that opinion, there is nothing which it can not achieve. 
But," he adds, " public opinion can not enforce church disci- 
pline now, because that discipline would not be now the 
expression of the voice of the church, but simply of a small 
part of the church, of the clergy only."* The church is 
probably aware of the necessity of having public opinion with 
her, and not being able yet to obtain it on this point ; for she 
still lays herself open to the old taunt of much wishing a 
certain species of discipline t to be restored, and yet of mak- 
ing no endeavor to obtain it. 

"Is not the expression in the Burial Service," asked Bos- 
well, " in the s^ue and certain hope of a (blessed) resurrec- 
tion, too strong to be used indiscriminately, and indeed, some- 
times, when those over whose bodies it is said have been 
notoriously profane ?" Johnson replied, " It is sure and 
certain hope, sir, not belief.''' " I did not," adds Boswell, 
" insist further ; but can not help thinking that less positive 
words would be more proper." 

It must be observed that Boswell has interpolated the 
word " blessed," and also omitted the article, the resurrec- 
tion ; an alteration since the time of King Edward the Sixth's 
first Prayer Book, and certainly one of importance. The 
expi-e.ssion afterward, '■'■our vile bodies," also takes away the 
individual application. Still, notwithstanding the efibrts of 
commentators, and what Boswell calls a " satisfactory" one 
by the Rev. Ralph Churton, whose interpretation ol' the 
words "eternal life" is ?msatisfactory, the intention of the 
church seems to be, in the first place, to render the words 
applicable to the identical deceased whose corpse is being 
interred, although, on a little after reflection, she just renders 
the form sufficiently doubtful, so as to avoid individual appli- 

* Christian Life, Sermon 38. 
t See Commination Service. 



120 DR. JOHNSON'S OHURCHMANSHIP. 

cation in a perfectly unwarrantable case. Johnson quotes 
the lines found in "Camden's Remains," upon a very wicked 
man, who was killed by a fall from his horse, in which he is 
supposed to say, 

" Between the stirrup and the ground, 
I mercy ask'd, I mercy found ;" 

but, alas ! how many die in a senseless state of drunkenness ; 
others too have no opportunity of seeking mercy, but die in 
the midst of a full career of sin. 

Perhaps, after all, the most objectionable words are, "our 
dear brother." There is something not only insincere, but 
profane, in the use of these words on such an occasion. 
They are words we should not use to the gross sinner, or the 
malicious schismatic, in his lifetime. We bury many who 
are strangers, but who, if we had known them, we should 
have so addressed ; and officially, as members of the house- 
hold of faith, we can truly designate each as "dear brother." 
The simple term "brother," as used in the American Service, 
would be hardly objectionable, and, in a natural sense, quite 
proper. I remember once, a very conscientious clergyman 
saying that he did not think it right that the bodies of 
deceased dissenters (if utter separatists and railers) should 
be carried into the church, but that he should use the dis- 
cretion given him by the rubric, and read the appointed 
service in the church-yard. But another clergyman observed, 
" Surely, if you are compelled to call the deceased ' our dear 
brother,' you need not strain at the gnat when swallowing 
the camel." Besides, such a course would be a useless 
indignity, supposed to be shown toward the deceased, and 
not taken as a caution or warning to churchmen., in which 
sense the above worthy clergyman intended it, and therefore 
it would be unwise and unchristian to offer such an offense, 
as 'it would be represented, to our differing brethren. Over 
muiy a dissenter heartily could the minister of the Church 
of England say, "our dear brother,"* but this is beside the 

* At the same time, it must be said, that it would be well if dis- 
senters, generally, would bury their own dead. If they will come to 
the church in death, after reviling her in life, they can hardly expect 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 121 

question ; it is in the cases of the grossly immoral, impeni- 
tent, almost wholly unbelieving, and of the bitter sectarian, 
that the conscience of the clergyman is wounded, and hence 
seeks relief. 

The church may be said to pass no sentence respectiiig 
the state of the departed, and this is right (Rom. xiv. 4 ; 
^ Matt. vii. 1 ) ; she speaks and hopes the best, which is char- 
itable (1 Cor. xiii. 5—7.). Still, in certain cases her words 
might be better if not of so strong a nature : though, if dis- 
cipline were restored, they would be unexceptionable. It is 
a grand, and affecting, and most comforting service, when 
used as the church at first provided : and our " hearty thanks" 
may be truly offered up, though in heavy sorrow, over the 
corpse of a beloved friend, for, to die is gain. 

" Oh what a difference," said Wesley, " is there between 
the English and Scotch mode of burial ! The English does 
honor to human nature, and even to the poor remains that 
were once a temple of the Holy Ghost : but when I see in 
Scotland a coffin put into the earth, and covered up without 
a word spoken, it reminds me of what was spoken concerning 
Jehoiakim, He shall he buried loith the burial of an ass." 
Southey, in his kind and masterly way observes,* " It was 
indeed no proof of judgment, or of feeling, to reject the finest 
and most afiecting ritual that ever was composed — a service 
that finds its way to the heart, when the heart stands most 
in need of such consolation, and is open to receive it" 



to be treated on equal terras with consistent chuichmen. It is sin- 
gular that dissenters, knowing the nature of the funeral service of the 
church, and that it is adapted (strictly speaking) to her beloved sons 
only, should endeavor to force the consciences of her ministers, them- 
selves not despising the claims of conscience. Still, let nothing savor- 
ing of indignity be offered ; and if they will persist in seeking burial at 
the hands of the church, let the church meet them in a forgetting and 
forgiving spirit. They are brethren. 
* Life of Wesley, vol. ii. page 248. 
F 



CHAPTER X. 
HIS CHURCHMANSHIP. 

Dr. Johnson defended the practice of requiring subscrip- 
tion to the thirty-nine Articles in those admitted to the uni- 
versities, thus : "As all who come into the country must 
obey the king, so all who come into an university must be 
of the church." May Ave not say, that much will depend 
upon the nature of the statutes of the university into which 
entrance is sought, together with the power of repealing or 
non-repealing such statutes ? just as the law of the land is 
subject to revocation and addition : in other words, it may 
be necessary to obey the existing statutes, but are those liable 
to alteration ? On another occasion he alluded to the alleged 
wrongness of making boys subscribe to articles they do not 
understand, and said, " The meaning of subscribing is, not 
that they fully understand all the articles, but that they will 
adhere to the Church of England." He had before asserted 
that the xiniversities were founded to bring up members for 
the Church of England {(jucere, some Romish endowments ?), 
and he went on to maintain, that if mere subscription of ad- 
herence to the Church of England were adopted, lads would 
still be puzzled to know what was meant by the term " Church 
of England," and M'herein it diflered from the Presbyterian, 
Romish, Greek, and Coptic churches. " But would it not 
be sufficient," asked Boswcll, " to subscribe the Bible ?" 
" Why, no, sir," returned Johnson, " for all sects will sub- 
scribe the Bible : nay, the Mohammedans will subscribe the 
Bible: for the Mohammedans acknowledge Jesus Christ, as 
well as Moses, but maintain, that God sent Mohammed as 
a still greater prophet than either." 

It is at once seen, that if the universities are to educate 
for the Church of England only, subscription to the Bible 
merely would not be sufficient to keep them exclusive, for 



DK. JOHNSON'S CHURGHMANSHIP. 123 

Roman Catholics, Socinians, Quakers, and all sects (with 
little modern exception), would readily do so, and at once 
enter the universities : and thus we should, as Johnson ex- 
pressed it, "supply our enemies with arms from our arsenal." 
The question is, whether it should continue to be " our 
arsenal" only, which forms a large subject, requiring for its 
solution much legal knowledge and decision. It was the de- 
bate on the petition of Archdeacon Blackburn, in favor of doing 
away with subscription, in the year 1792 (which was lost by a 
division of 2 1 7 to 7 1 ), which called forth Johnson's observations. 

At another time, in connection with the subject of predes- 
tination, Boswell asked, " Is it necessary, sir, to believe all 
the thirty-nine Articles ?" " Why, sir," replied Johnson, 
"that is a question that has been much agitated. Some 
have thought it necessary that they should all be believed : 
others have considered them to be only articles of peace, that 
is to say, you are not to preach against them." 

The reasoning of Archdeacon Paley on subscription to ar- 
ticles of religion will occur to the reader's mind, and will 
serve to emancipate the over-scrupulous person. It is well 
that subscription should be required only to such articles as 
are of almost universal agreement. 

Dr. Johnson approved of bishops having seats in the House 
of Lords ; " Who is more proper," he asked, " for having the 
dignity of a peer, than a bishop, provided a bishop be what 
he ought to be ?" But this is hardly the right way of put- 
ting a question which is one of the highest importance to the 
church. Doubtless, bishops make good peers, and so would 
clergymen, with Johnson's qualification, make good baronets. 
But does the peer improve the bishop, or do the duties of a 
peer in Parliament interfere with the diocesan labors of a 
bishop ? It is said, that the church requires the advocacy 
of bishops in Parliament, and that no other persons can un- 
derstand so well the wants of the church. But is this true ? 
and will not support of the church come with better grace, 
and greater power, from the tongues of laymen, and can not 
lay churchmen be equally schooled in all the wishes of the 
church ? Indeed, bishops differ so much, and vote so directly 
in opposition to one another on many matters which involve 



124 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

the interests of the church, that the church herself is be- 
wildered in attempting to distinguish between friends and 
foes on the episcopal bench : and after all, the main assist- 
ance to the church must be derived from the lay peers, who 
form the very great majority of the House. In the House of 
Commons, where she needs most help, the church is left in 
the hands of her lay friends, and we hear no complaints from 
the great body of the clergy of her interests being inadequately 
represented and pleaded in the face of many harsh opponents. 
The same arguments that serve to retain bishops in the House 
of Lords, ought to be urged for the election of members of the 
inferior clergy into the House of Commons. 

Bishops also are expected to speak and vote on general 
questions of politics, and this tends to give the church a polit- 
ical complexion. Not only must much time be consumed by 
them (if they be conscientious men) in acquainting them- 
selves with the great subjects debated, and in making them- 
selves masters of Acts of Parliament, but also their speeches 
and votes are freely and unceremoniously canvassed in the 
lower as well as higher species of newspapers ; and when 
we know the license given to political discussion and vitu- 
peration, it is not pleasing to see good and pious men, 
whom we ought always to behold with reverence, exposed to 
the mere wanton attacks of newspaper scribblers ; neither, 
on the other hand, do we like to see vast praise lavished on 
a man for the display of abilities that would have been more 
appropriately exercised on his religious vocation. I remem- 
ber once hearing some London lawyers of great eminence, 
who had been engaged in conducting a bill through the 
House of Lords, a bill which to a great extent served the 
cause of humanity, speak very highly of the arduous and 
availing labors of a certain excellent bishop, who was always 
at his post, and aided the cause greatly by his unwearied ap- 
plication and superior abilities ; but, after all, the matter 
would have been better (not done better) in the hands of a 
lay peer, when we consider that the bishop was compelled to 
be absent from his diocese, and to attend for awhile to his 
spiritual functions with secondary zeal. It is quite true, that 
more bishops are needed in the church, proportionate to the 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP 125 

increase of population ; for the number of bishops at present 
existent, bears no comparison with the numbers in primitive 
ages, and even immediately on the Reformation : but may 
it not be considered, that if bishops were removed from the 
House of Lords, each man might perform double or treble 
the supervision that he now is enabled to exercise ; though 
dioceses, as at present constituted, are very far too extended 
and populous for the oversight of one man, even were his 
time entirely confined to that woi'k. Numbers of the clergy 
actually only set eyes on their own bishop once in three 
years, and then only set eyes on him ; while thousands upon 
thousands of Christian people live long lives, and, excepting, 
it may be, at the period of Confirmation, go down to the 
grave without once beholding the father of the diocese in 
which they reside. God forbid, that ever a popular revolu- 
tion should hurl the bishops from the House of Lords, for 
with such an act the House of Lords itself would probably 
fall ; but would that the bishops themselves would demand, 
in the beautiful and forcible words of the eloquent Bishop of 
Oxfoi'd, as applied to other secular matters, " entire exemp- 
tion from the secular labors of a peer of Parliament, with all 
its usually accompanying secular life." The episcopal office 
is one, the possessor of which, from the nature of its respons- 
ibility and sanctity, must be either venerable or contemptible ; 
and it is with this view strongly in his mind, that the present 
writer would desire to see the episcopal office rescued from 
every intense occupation of secular interest, and from every 
stain of wordliness, so that the former epithet might ever be 
fully merited, and lastingly maintained. 

There is a long standing, constitutional question connected 
with this matter, which should be seriously weighed, and 
considered in all its bearings ; but it may be very probable 
that the religious advantages would be discerned to be ad- 
vanced by the separation of the political and spiritual privi- 
leges of the episcopate; and who then would rejoice more in 
being set free than the bishops themselves? How valuable 
would have been Dr. Johnson's deliberate sentiments, drawn 
out in full logical array, upon many of these important sub- 
jects I But, as Boswell remarks, " Though in his writings, 



126 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

and upon all occasions, a great friend to the constitution, both 
in church and state, he has never written expressly in sup- 
port of either." 

The inequality of the livings of the English clergy, and 
the scanty payment of curates, was spoken of when Johnson 
observed, " Why, yes, sir ; but it can not be helped. You 
must consider, that the revenues of the clergy are not at the 
disposal of the state, like the pay of an army. Different 
men have founded different churches : and some are better 
endowed, and some worse. The state can not interfere and 
make an equal division of Avhat has been particularly appro- 
priated. Now, when a clergyman has but a small living, 
or even two small livings, he can afford very little to the 
curate." At another time Boswell alluded to the very small 
salaries of some of the clergy, when Johnson remarked, " To 
be sure, sir, it is wrong that any clergyman should be with- 
out a reasonable income ; but, as the church revenues were 
sadly diminished at the Reformation, the clergy who have 
livings can not afford, in many instances, to give good salaries 
to curates, without leaving themselves too little." 

It is not curates only, it is the small incumbents of the 
Church of England who are her poorest ministers :* they have 
more difficulity in obtaining payment of their scanty incomes, 
and have to pay poor rates, road rates, taxes, and other 

* The following is a portion of a petition drawn up by several of 
the clergy, at the close of the year 1848 : 

" Many of the most diligent and devoted ministers of the church, 
through anxiet}' for the support and comfort of their families, without 
any provision for themselves in old age or declining health, or any 
prospect of leaving to their families even a supply of the common neces- 
saries and comforts of life, in case of their removal, have had their 
minds materially unfitted for the comfortable discharge of their duties, 
have been unable to meet the demands which the various societies, 
whether charitable or religious, of the present day have upon them, 
have been therefore discouraged in promoting such societies, and have 
found it difficult to maintain that influence, and authority, and independ- 
ence of spirit, which is so necessary for a public and authorized teacher 
of our holy religion. 

" We feel also that the inadequate support provided for so large a 
number of the ministers of Voluntary Churches has greatly tended 
to increase the evil." 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 127 

charges, besides usually to keep a house and premises in. 
sound repair. There can be little doubt that the spoliation 
of church property by Henry the Eighth was far too extend- 
ed : and many lords and gentlemen are now in possession of 
incomes that ought to be expended in the service of religion, 
and are greatly needed for that purpose in many parts of the 
country. It has been quaintly remarked, that Henry the 
Eighth amended what was amiss even as the devil amended 
his dame's leg (as it is in the proverb), when he should have 
set it right, he brake it quite in pieces. And the poor as 
well as the clergy have been sufferers ; for, notes the histo- 
rian, where ^20 was given to the poor yearly, in more than 
a hundred places in England, is not one meal's meat given. 
Reform or remodeling, according to the primitive institution, 
" would not have satisfied the ends of himself (Henvy VIII.), 
and his covetous and ambitious agents. They all aimed at 
the revenues and riches of the religious houses. For which 
reason no arts and contrivances were to be passed by that 
might be of use in obtaining those ends. The most abomin- 
able crimes were to be charged on the religious, and the charge 
was to be managed with the utmost industry, boldness, and 
dexterity. This was a powerful argument to draw an odium 
upon them, and to make them disrespected and ridiculed by 
the generality of mankind. And yet, after all, the proofs 
were so insufficient, that from what I have been able to 
gather" (records the Protestant writer),* "I have not found 
any direct one against even any single monastery. When 
all accusations failed, ejection by force was resorted to, and thus 
by degrees the religious houses, and the estates belonging to 
them, having yielded to the king, he either sold or gave them 
to the lay nobility and gentry, contrary to what he had at 
first pretended.'' \ Even Bishop Latimer petitioned that 

* See preface to Dugdale's Monasticon. 

t See Coke's Instit. part iv. p. 44. The project was, that "If the 
Parliament woukl give unto him (Henry the Eighth) all the abbeys, 
priories, friaries, nunneries, and other monasteries, that forever in time 
then to come he would take order, that the same should not be converted 
to private wsc, but set apart for public services, among others, the 
maintenance of 40,000 soldiers, the creation of a number of nobles, &c. 
Tiie said monasteries were given to the king by authority of divers 



128 DR. JOHNSON'S CHUKCHMANSHIP. 

some of these ancient houses might be preserved.* It is 
gratifying to observe the efforts which are being made in the 
present day to recover the aUenated property of the church 
by the Tithe Redemption Association, at the head of which 
are those two excellent noblemen, of different political senti- 
ments. Lord Robert Grosvenor and Lord John Manners. t 

In regard to the abstract question of endowments for relig- 
ious purposes, there seems to be no objection. All sects and 
classes of dissenters accept them, and some are in possession, 
of endowments of no mean value. Endowment, when 
adequate to the support of the minister, may be called 
freedom from all payment : and only an endowed church 
can say that she preaches the Gospel without money and 
vidthout price to the people. Farmers that pay tithe or 
rent-charge, in so doing pay nothing of their own to the 
church. The matter may be familiarly explained in this 
way. Suppose a Christian, some fifty years ago, ordered 
in his will that a certain sum should be paid out of the 
rents of his landed estate to a county hospital ; and suppose 
that the landlord of those estates desired the tenants (instead 
of bringing that bequeathed sum to him for his own use) to 
hand it over to the treasurer of the hospital, according to the 
wishes of the donor. Such tenants would be rogues if they 
did not faithfully pay the money : but still they could never 
say that they were paying it out of their own pockets. It 

Acts of Parliament : but no provision ivas therein made for the said pro- 
ject, or any part thereof : the king took all to himself." See Calvin's 
Institutes, lib. iv. c. 13. Dugdale, vol. ii. p. 121. 

* "After the visitation of the religious houses by commissioners 
I'rom the king, divers of the visitors did petition the king that some of 
the houses, both for the virtue of the persons in them, and the benefit 
of the country (the poor receiving thence great relief, and the richer 
sort good education for their children), might be retained. Bishop 
Latimer also moved, that two or three might be left in every shire for 
pious uses ; but Cromwell, by the king's permission, invaded all, while 
between threats, gifts, persuasions, promises, and whatsoever might 
make a man obnoxious, he obtained of the abbots, priors, abbesses, &c., 
that their houses might be given up." — From Lord Herberts History 
of King Henry the Eighth^ p. 442. 

t Sir Henry Spelman's History, of Sacrilege &c., and the singular 
fatality attendant on the owners of Cowdray, and of other properties, 
will occur to the reader. 



DR. JOHNSON'S GHURCHMANSHIP. 129 

is true that their labor has earned the money from the land 
(as it has earned their rent, for all wealth is created by in- 
dustry) ; it is true that it passes through their hands ; but 
this is all ; it never was, and never will be their own : 
therefore they can not be said to subscribe to the hospital 
out of their own pockets. Such is tithe or rent-charge. 
The tenant is only intrusted to pay a sum, that never was 
his own, to the account of the clergyman ; and from him 
the clergyman receives no kind of gift or reward. If the 
tenth part of the land itself were set apart instead of the 
tenth of its produce, could the occupiers of the remainder 
complain they paid out of their own pockets ? But the case 
js the same. 

What an expense would be brought on the religious com- 
munity, if the endowments of the church were done away : 
for the voluntary principle, of which we hear so much, is 
one of pure, unmitigated, personal charge. If an individual 
pays but one shilling per week, or per month, that shilling 
is his own payment, the produce of his own labor or estate. 
It is a principle to which the church is in some localities 
compelled to resort, but happier is the church that is free 
from such a chain. Paley* has well described the evils 
likely to accrue from an adoption of the voluntary principle. 
" Many," he says, in common with Dr. Chalmers, " would 
take advantage of the option which was thus imprudently 
left open to them, and this liberty might finally operate to 
the decay of virtue, and irrecoverable forgetfulness of all re- 
ligion in the country." And even where payments might 
be willingly made, the evils of the system are apparent ; and 
surely the dissenters have ample evidence of this. Why 
should they attempt to force a system upon the country 
which has ever been a failure with themselves ? For, 
alas ! while some few men of popular talent are success- 
ful, numbers are, notwithstanding their most urgent appeals 
to their flocks for pecuniary support, reduced to beggary ; 
or, rather, since their begging fails, to poverty ? Good 
men among them deeply feel their dependent condition. 
" Men of finer and more ethereal temperament," says a 
* See his chapter on Religious Establishments, and Toleration. 



130 DR. JOHNSON'S CHUKCHMANSHIP 

modern, writer,* " sink under the indignities and privations 
they endure in what they conceive to be the path of duty, 
and die broken-hearted. The real cause of their untimely 
departure is little understood by the people with whom they 
are associated. Sustained in their last hours by faith in 
their Redeemer, their lamented fate is ascribed to their anx- 
ious zeal too rapidly wearing out the springs of life : and 
their names are enrolled in the obituary of the sect, as a tea- 
tiriio7iy to the goodness of that system ivhich destroyed them.'' 
The question of endowments is quite a difterent one, yet 
often mixed up with that of the separation of church and 
state. Churches which have no connection with the state, 
such as the Episcopal Church in America, enjoy their own 
endowments. Endowments are not fi'om the state, they 
very mainly proceed from voluntary benefactions. Nothing 
but a system of might before right could rob the church of 
her revenues, derived, not from the people's pockets, but 
from the gifts of people many centuries deceased. The dis- 
senters think (if we may judge by the opinions of some) 
that the church is to run away, in a destitute condition, 
from the embrace of the too enamored state ; she is not, as 
of old, to " spoil the Egyptians," but is to walk out of the 
grand state hotel, leaving all her bag and baggage behind 
her, and start upon a new railway pilgrimage, with nothing 
to pay her fare I But no ; this robbery can never be coun- 
tenanced in moral and honest England : if the church is to 
be divorced from the state, let her, at least, take her own 
revenues, v/ith her, giving unto Caesar that which is Caesar's, 
but retaining for God that which is clearly and indisputa- 
bly God's. And what of her property is not her own ?i" In 
point of fact, the state has no ecclesiastical patronage, for all 
rights of presentation are private property, of which the state 
or legislature merely guarantees the quiet possession and 

* Hull's Ecclesiastical Establishments not inconsistent with Chris- 
tianity. Hatchard. Page 74. 

t On this matter, see The State in its Relations with the Church, 
by W. E. Gladstone, Esq. M. P., especially Chapter iii. p. 103, &c. 
The property of the church, he maintains was not so much from tithes 
as from " gifts of lands which were notoriously and indisputably 
voluntary." 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 131 

free exercise. The crown possesses patronage ; so do cor- 
porations ; but neither of these are the state. If a church, 
built and endowed by an individual now, be deserving of 
legal protection, why should not a church built and endowed 
by the same voluntary means four hundred years ago, be 
treated with the 'same consideration ? Length of usage 
surely improves and strengthens a title. If the church goes 
forth from the state, she must, on all the grounds of laAV, of 
justice, of equity, of common right, and common sense, go 
forth with what is her own in her hand, and on h^r back : 
at her peril, she must not resign those sacred treasures 
which have been solemnly delivered over to her care, her 
guardianship, and her direction. For we must bear in 
mind, that no antagonistic society of Christians, excepting 
the Church of Rome, is laying claim to her revenues ; so 
that endowments granted solely for spiritual purposes, for the 
health of the souls of the people, would be utterly taken 
away from religion, and expended on things purely secular. 
There would be no changing of owners, such as took place 
at the Reformation : although, since dissenters refuse not en- 
dowments for themselves, it is difficult to see how they could 
consistently refuse the endowments of the Church of England, 
if they could get them. 

The union of church and state is another question, and 
yet it is thought to be bound up, some way or other, with 
the property of the church. Strange that a separation should 
be sought, because it is surely a sound principle that govern- 
ments are bound to provide for the best welfare of their peo- 
ple ; and indeed this is a truth never questioned by statesmen 
or philosophers down to the period of the nineteenth century. 
If the state has not power given her to promote religion, how 
can she claim power for repressing vice and encouraging mo- 
rality ? "We need be little moved," says Gladstone, "by 
the taunts of those who reproach us with a ' law church.' 
It is a law church ; we rejoice in the fact : but how ? just 
as, by the sovereign's proclamation against vice, the morals 
of the nation are crown morals.'' And, recollect, the law 
is Christian law; and law administered, too, by Christian 
men. Hence Dr. Arnold glories in the union of church and 



U'.2 DU. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

state. They are one and the same thing m his idea. He 
says,* " The perfect state and the perfect church are identi- 
cal ;" and again, " The state can not he perfect till it possess 
the wisdom of the church, nor the church be perfect till it 
possess the power of the state ; the one has, as it were, the 
soul, and the other the organized body, each of which requires 
to be united with the other ;" and he appears to applaud 
" the original idea of the Church of England, as only another 
name for the state and nation of England."! Burke was of 
the same opinion, for he says, "In a Christian common- 
wealth, tire church and the state are one and the same thing, 
being difierent integral parts of the same whole." And this 
great man, whom Dr. Johnson thought a great man, further 
said, " Religion is so far, in my opinion, from being out of 
the province or duty of a Christian magistrate, that it is, and 
it ought to be, not only his care, but the 'principal thing in 
Ms care ; because it is one of the great bonds of human so- 
ciety, and its object the supreme good, the ultimate end and 
object of man himself" Quotations from wise men might 
be multiplied, but this one is sufficient. 

It must be minded that separation of church and state 
does not mean the swamping of lay power, and the placing 
the government of the church in clerical hands only. At 
present the church acknowledges herself, even in her govern- 
ing powers, to be composed of laity and clergy ; and though 
not created by Act of Parliament, neither to be annihilated 
by Act of Parliament, and hence, not liable to the ignorant 
sarcasm of being a Parliamentary church; yet she is, for 
some purposes (not as a church, but as an establishment), in 
the hands of Parliament ; and since Parliament is elected by 

* Arnold's Lectures on Modern History, p. 51-59 ; and 246. 

t I know that many are inclined to say, that Parliament is becoming 
infidel, and the state is separating from the chm-ch, not the church from 
the state — which of course would affect the validity of the above ai'gu- 
merit. "' You are treating Parliament all through," such will exclaim, 
" as if composed of Christians, instead of persons, a great proportion of 
whom are de jure excommunicate, either for immorality or schism." 
Why does not the chui-ch excommunicate them de facto ? Why does 
she not extricate herself from their clutches ? may be questions thai 
naturally occur. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 133 

the people, she is in the hands of the electoral bodies of the 
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. She is un- 
der the control and influence of laymen far more than any 
sect ; especially, for instance, such a sect as the Wesleyans, 
whose government in America is wholly ecclesiastical, and in 
England nearly so ; and governed, too, by a self-elected body, 
who eschew the representative principle as practiced by those 
vast bodies of men who control the Church of England. 
Doubtless, the church would be more independent if freed 
from the state ; for then, like other sects, she could make 
her own laws, appoint her own officers, and, in all things, do 
as she liked : but might we not justly fear that her power, 
considering her wealth, talent, and numbers, would become 
too great ? Should not the nation at large be rightly jealous 
of the authority of the church to meet in convocation, to re- 
fuse the crown the appointment to bishoprics, and to make 
canons at her discretion ? Parliament has always broken 
through the absoluteness of church government of modern 
times. The canons of 1640, passed by Laud in the fullness 
of his power, were done away by the Parliament, and the 
writ " De haeretico comburendo" abolished by parliamentary 
law. And we know how it has abolished, of very late time, 
tests and oaths, which were an impediment to the free exer- 
cise of conscience : so that the very men who would first and 
most feel the absence of parliamentary restraint on the church, 
are those who are, unreasonably enough, crying out for the 
separation of church and state; Let such men listen to the 
salutary warning of the late Dr. Arnold : " If men run away," 
he says,* " with the mistaken notion that liberty of conscience 
is threatened only by a state religion, and not at all by a 
church reUgion, the danger is, that they will abandon religion 
altogether to what they call the church ; that is, to the 
power of a society far worse governed than most states, and 
likely to lay far heavier burdens on individual conscience, be- 
cause the spirit dominant in it is narrower and more intoler- 
ant." We have perfect religious liberty now ; such relig- 
ious liberty as Paley speaks of, when he says, " Religious 
liberty is, like civil liberty, not an immunity from restraint 
* Lectures on Modern History, p. 46. 



134 r DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

but the being restrained by no law but what in a greater de- 
gree conduces to the public toelfareT 

By such laws the church is now controlled. Men should 
consider, that, if deprived of her endowments, she would still 
be the wealthiest and most authoritative religious body in the 
state : and since we may well suppose that her numbers (as re-r 
garded veritable and devoted members) would increase rather 
than decrease — for dissenters, if they speak honestly now, 
would themselves then rush into the church — might it not 
be a just fear lest in time she would overpower the state, 
rather than the state trample upon her ? If church and 
state are to be separated (and who are to separate them ? for 
the state, we may imagine, would rather continue the alli- 
ance), men ought to insist that the government of the church 
be in the hands of the laity and clergy alike, and not intrust- 
ed to ecclesiastical and spiritual persons only. The arrange- 
ments of the Episcopal Church in America, one of the fore- 
most churches in Christendom, may be held up as a pattern 

a church that never hears or raises the cry of " church in 

danger," because she is governed only by churchmen, while 
the Church of England is compelled to submit (and hence 
the high church party encourage the idea of separation), to 
the legislative enactments of enemies mingled with friends — 
a church that is reared on a noble and wide platform of laical 
voting, and laical help, direction, and correction. It is for 
the people of England calmly to consider, whether they will 
best enjoy their rights and liberties under a system of church 
and state, or with a church free and unshackled from union 
with the state, to do as she pleases : and it is for the clergy 
and superior laity to consider also, whether they are prepared, 
if need be, to go into the wilderness and erect a palatial 
greatness of their own : promulgate their laws : lord it over 
their followers : and in all their desires advance right ahead, 
as though there were no such things as a House of Commons 
and electoral bodies of the people existent in the nation. 

This is a question of vast moment to millions, and must 
be wisely adjudicated, with avoidance of all extreme notions 
which are apt to be indulged in by heated factions. The 
subversion of the church would rob an immense mass of 



DR. JOHxMSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 135 

the people of tlieir accustomed and loved means of religious 
instruction, free of expense comparatively ; while such an 
act would unsettle their minds, demoralize the country, and 
" substitute disorder and infidelity for the benign influences 
of the most graceful institution that adorns and blesses the 
land." It is very probable, that the very great majority of 
dissenters are, as we know the Wesleyans earnestly to be, in 
favor of an establishment of religion ; and certainly dissent- 
ers have no more reason to seek the subversion of the Es- 
tablished Church, as a matter of conscience, than any one 
sect of them should feel it incumbent on them to desire the 
overthrow of every other sect.* Difference of opinion there 
will always be, and we are not to seek the fitness of all men 
to a Procrustean bed, but to learn to bear with diversities of 
sentiment, and while we rejoice in our own settledness, seek 
to promote the peace and welfare of others ; for, says St. 
Paul, if I had all faith and had not charity, 1 am nothing 
" He," observes Jeremy Taylor on this text, " who, upon 
confidence of his true belief, denies a charitable communion 
to his brother, lo&es the reivard of both." 

The question of private patronage is a far more important 
one to the church at large, clergy aird laity, than that of 
connection of the church with the state. Perhaps this is 
often confounded in people's minds with the other : and ig- 
norant persons, who are led to believe that their pastor is a 
" state parson," may be apt to think that with the disrup- 
tion of church and state, the state parson must succumb ; 

* In Cromwell's time, under different circumstances, such an at- 
tempt was made. In all ages, in lesser or greater extent, such a 
spirit may be exhibited. It is harder in matters of religion, than in 
political affairs, to induce pei'sons to be tolerant, to grant liberty of 
thought to others. It was well said, in regard to political, and equally 
applicable to religious toleration, " I think it unreasonable that gentle- 
men, who are always so merry upon every man ivho differs from them, 
should be so much irritated when any one presumes to use the same 
liberty with them. To roast a minister, or a placeman, is their common 
diversion ; but 07ice smile at a patriot, they are instantly in arms. Such 
a breach of decency and good breeding calls for the loudest outcries, 
and severest resentment." Portion of a speech luckily preserved in 
the scanty Reports of Debates in the House of Commons, 1740. — See 
Gentkman^s Magazine, vol. x. p. 499. 



136 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

often too, perhaps the word " state" is confounded with that 
of " law," for, after all, in the case of both churchmen and 
dissenters, it is the law of the land, more than the state, that 
is their principal protection. 

It is a fact, that the great mass of church patronage, or 
presentation to livings, is in the gift of the laity : that is, 
lords, and squires, and other possessors of landed and house- 
hold property, appoint the clergyman to the care of a parish. 
It is true, that this right is limited, owing to the tests re- 
quired by the church ; and herein consists a main use of 
such tests. But for these, as Paley observes,* " a Popish 
patron might appoint a priest to say mass to a congregation 
of Protestants : an Episcopal clergyman be sent to officiate 
in a parish of Presbyterians : or a Presbyterian divine to in- 
veigh against the errors of Popery before an audience of 
Papists." He also notes the disturbance, the bitter animosi- 
ties, the unconquerable aversions, that would be engendered 
by popular election of a minister, according as, on each 
vacancy, one sectarian party or other prevailed in the parish 
or district ; all which is to show us, that with a legal and 
established payment there must, for peace sake, be legal pref- 
erence cf one particular religion to all others. But with pat- 
ronage, as it at present holds, we have only now to do ; and 
therefore it is well to state, in the outset, that the exercise 
of private patronage is much restricted by the tests proposed 
by the church. 

Dr. Johnson has, in a great degree, treated this subject 
elaborately and admirably. He argues on the case of patron- 
age in Scotland, which is much the same with that exercised 
in England. As regards the positive right of patronage, 
since it is a matter of law and not conscience, he says well, 
" No man's conscience can tell him the rights of another man ; 
they must be known by rational investigation or historical 
inquiry." Again, he observes, '=It is a conscience very ill 
informed, that violates the rights of one man for the conven- 
ience of another." 

He tells us whence the right of patronage was derived. 
On Christiaiaity being established, and a public mode of 
* Moral Philosophy.' On Toleration, vol. ii. p. 315. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 137 

worship prescribed, public places of worship were required, 
and ministers to officiate in them : hence the landed proprie- 
tors, on becoming converts to the faith, built such places, and 
set apart lands for the maintenance of pastors to administer 
to the religious wants and welfare of their families and vas- 
sals ; the extent of a manor and a parish being usually the 
same. The endowment of the church being the gift of the 
landlord, he thought himself at liberty to give the possession 
of it to whatever minister he pleased ; "the people did not 
choose him, because the people did not pay him." This right 
has ever followed the lands ; it is possessed by the same regis- 
try by which the lands are possessed. 

The right being certain, next comes the convenience of it. 
.Dr. Johnson is an advocate for its continuance, in its present 
integrity. Abuses, he seems to think, can not be avoided. 
" It were to be desired," he says, speaking of property in gen- 
eral, with his usual sense of humanity, " that power should 
be only in the hands of the merciful, and riches in the pos- 
session of the generous : but the law must leave both power 
and riches where it finds them ; and must often leave riches 
with the covetous, and power with the cruel." He does not 
think the people would gain by a change in the right of pat- 
ronage. " Why," he asks, "should we suppose that the parish 
will make a wiser choice than the patron ? " The patron, 
he thinks, may be the only judge in a parish of a minister's 
learning, and of his piety not less a judge than others. Also 
that the patron would be most offended by deficiencies in the 
pastor, because it would be imputed to his own absurdity or 
corruption. He is more likely, too, to inquire beforehand 
into a minister's qualifications and character, than " one of 
the parochial rabble, who can give nothing but a vote." 
Dr. Johnson, on this subject, argues like a counselor who is 
retained to make the best of his case ]j&^ fi<'S et nefas. It 
must be seen by an impartial looker-on, that he avoids all 
middle courses, and ranges before his mental vision nothing 
save the patron on one hand, and the whole people of a 
parish on the other. And thus he goes on to descant, and, 
it may be, without exaggeration, on the evils of the popular 
election of a minister. These evils are very great. A min- 



133 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

ister must ply all the arts, perhaps bribery and flattery, of a 
candidate: and when he has won the day, "on what terms," 
asks Dr. Johnson, " does he enter upon his ministry but those 
of enmity ttrith Jialfhis j^cirish ? " And how shrewd are the 
following remarks, made with a keen knowledge of human 
nature in its common practice I " Of a minister presented by 
the patron, the parish has seldom any thing worse to say than 
that they do not know him. Of a minister chosen by a pop- 
ular contest, all those who do not favor him have nursed up 
in their bosoms principles of hatred and reasons of rejection. 
Anger is excited principally by pride. The pride of a com- 
mon man is very little exasperated by the supposed usurpation 
of an acknowledged superior. He bears only his little share 
of a general evil, and suffers in common with the whole parish : 
but when the contest is between equals, the defeat has many 
aggravations^; and he that is defeated by his next neighbor 
is seldom satisfied without some revenge ; and it is hard to 
say what bitterness of malignity would prevail in a parish 
where these elections should happen to be frequent, and the 
enmity of opposition should be rekindled before it cooled." 

Unfortunately, there are parishes in connection with the 
Church of England, where popular election prevails. These 
times usually present a scene of intemperance, confusion, and 
the display of wrathful temper. " Williams and the Gospel 
forever ! " '• No Jones and Church I " " Down with Smith 
and Sacraments I " are loudJy shouted by drunken men at 
their wits' end. And when even the popular man has been 
elected, he has been subjected to acts of insolence and spolia- 
tion (his windows broken — his harness cut to pieces — garden 
ravaged), by miscreants of the opposite party : and often he 
himself, innocently and unsuspectingly, is the cause of enmity 
between more respectable persons, before whom he can not 
exhibit the symbols of the body and blood of the Lord of 
peace, until they be "in love and charity vv^ith their neighbors ! " 
How often does the popular abuse of a privilege prevent men 
from countenancing an advance toward its moderate use : 
how often do men hug the military despot, from their horror 
of popular tyranny and anarchy I Yet, because popular elec- 
tion of ministers, in its full extent, is to be avoided — and 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMAtJSHIP. 139 

certainly we have no instance of such popular election record- 
ed in the New Testament — still we may not be debarred 
from considering whether a modified system of parochial elec- 
tion may not be resorted to with great advantage. For see 
how dire the case is with a Unitarian Lord-Chancellor on 
the woolsack, and with lords, and country gentlemen, of infidel 
or profligate principles : and hence, by what an almost heretic, 
or by what a reprobate, unknown to the bishop of the diocese, 
may church livings be possessed I How painful, even to a 
dying evangelical pastor, to know that a son or nephew of the 
patron will succeed him, and such person famed mainly for 
sporting habits, or cai-elessness ; thus leaving the best of the 
flock to wander from their lawful shepherd to seek the green- 
ness of other pastures ! In many cases, too, a minister may 
not be a bad man ; he may not be a sportsman, he may not 
be careless, but he may not be such a man as the parishioners 
have been accustomed to hear, accustomed to welcome into 
their houses, accustomed to regard as an aflectionate counselor 
and comforter in sickness and in health — he may not be a 
Vich Ian Vohr * to the devoted clan. Ay, he may be a good 
man, a kind man, a sensible man, but not the man to minis- 
ter to their spiritual necessities and edification. 

And how is this to be remedied? It may be answered, 
by a modification of the system. Let not the patron be ab- 
solute, neither let the "parochial rabble," as Johnson terms 
them, have a vote : but let the matter be decided by the best, 
the most exemplary residents in the parish, acting in con- 
junction with the patron. And those should be judged to be 
•most exemplary, who are the most regular attendants on the 
ordinances of the church, and most endued with her spirit of 
unfeigned faith and piety. There ought to be some plan of 
this kind adopted, now that the church claims to be account- 
ed a national church, and a clergyman regards himself, by this 
episcopal license, as the minister of the whole of the people 
resident in the parish to which he is appointed, and not only, 
as in olden time, for the benefit of the patron's family and 
dependents : and it will happen, that the people will desire 
and demand this voice at a time when it may be perilous to 

* In allusion to the pathetic farewell words of Fergus Mclvor, in 
Wavcrlcy. 



140 DR. JCWNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

the existence of the church to ofter it with our proposed Umits ; 
perilous, because what a patron is asked wiUingly to concede 
now, may be exacted by a power of might before right, which 
respects no individual will, and no national law. 

And, after all, a sensible patron would wish to act in 
conformity with the views of the respectable and religious in- 
habitants of a parish. It is very pleasing to find Dr. John- 
son counseling such a fulfillment of an important and sacred 
duty. He thought "that a patron should exercise his right 
with tenderness to the inclinations of the people of a parish : " 
and in his famous argument in defence of lay patronage,* 
from which we have quoted above, he observes, "If, by some 
strange concurrence, all the voices of a parish should unite in 
the choice of any single man, though I could not charge the 
patron with injustice for presenting a minister, I should cen- 
sure him as unkind and injudicious." We find from his 
beautiful allegory of Patronage in the " Rambler," that 
although she set out with that " dignity of aspect which 
struck terror into false merit," yet that ere long she was found 
to be " but half a goddess," and her decisions had been some- 
times erroneous : at last she began to " degenerate toward 
terrestrial nature, and forgot the precepts of Justice and 
Truth." Bishop Burnet speaks strongly : f " Perpetual ad- 
vowsons," which are kept in families as a provision for a child, 
who must be put in orders, tohatever his aversion, to it or un- 
fitness for it may be, bring a prostitution on holy things. 
And parents, who present their undeserving children, have 
this aggravation of their guilt, that they are not so apt to be 
deceived in this case as they may be when they present a 
stranger. Concerning these they may be imposed on by the 
testimony of those whom they do not suspect : but they must 
be supposed to be better informed as to their own children." 

Johnson might write with all the greater authority on this 
delicate and difficult matter, since he so nobly refused a pres- 
entation to an incumbency. This is a matter deserving both 
these epithets : delicate, because we seem to impugn the 
judgment or conscience of patrons to a greater degree than 
there may be actual warrant for : difficult, because we are 

* In the Appendix to Croker's Edition of Boswell. 

I The Pastoral Care, in the Clergyman's Instructor, 4th edit. p. 230. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 141 

interfering with the best established rights of private property ; 
and it may be argued, that if one portion of our property is 
not secure against the law of innovation and change, neither 
can we trust that the other will always be. On the whole, 
the present system is far better in its practice than the theory 
of it would lead us to expect ; for in theory it appears unsound 
and anomalous : but still it would be well, we would venture 
to think, if some plan of the kind above suggested could be 
assented to by the patrons ; for we hold that it would recon- 
cile people, very extensively, to the church, both in her tem- 
poral and spiritual capacities, and very probably there would, 
in due time, arise a strong desire to restore the ancient discipline 
of the Christian church. It must be some moderated scheme 
as the above suggested one, or the main grievance would still 
remain, that of placing the patronage in the hands of ungodly 
persons, by adopting universal suffrage in regard to the in- 
habitants of a parish : and besides, the clergy themselves, 
in some instances, in populous places, might be led, instead 
of flattering one person, to flatter the age, which, of the two 
kinds of hateful pandering, is the most mischievous, and fully 
as degrading. The poet Wordsworth* describes such a one 
who, excited by the breaking out of the French Revolution, and 
hastening from his rural and retired home into the metropolis : 

" Thither his popular talents he transferr'd ; 
And from the pulpit zealously maintain'd 
The cause of Christ and civil liberty, 
As one, and moving to one glorious end. 
Intoxicating service !" 

But how does the poet picture his sad and miserable end, 
when, 

"In despite 
Of all this outside bravery, within, 
He neither felt encouragement nor hope : 
For moral dignity, and strength of mind, 
Were wanting, and simplicity of life ; 
And reverence for himself; and, last and best, 
Confiding thoughts through love and fear of Him 
Before whose sight the troubles of this world 
Are vain as billows in a tossing sea." 



* The Excursion, book ii. p. 49-51. 



CHAPTER XI. 
HIS CHURCHMANSHIP 

Dr. Johnson read many works in divinity, and was well 
acquainted with the writings of some of the most celebrated 
divines of the Church of England, as well as with a few of 
those of dissenting denominations. Sir John Pringle once 
expressed a wish that Boswell would ask him, What were 
the best English sermons for style ? Accordingly, Boswell 
took a fitting opportunity, and began with a name which 
probably he thought would best secure Johnson's favorable 
judgment and sympathy. 

Boswell. — " Atterbury ?" 

Johnson. — "Yes, sir, one of the best." 

Boswell. — " Tillotson ?" 

Johnson. — " Why, not now. I should not advise a 
preacher at this day to imitate Tillotson's style : though I 
don't know : / should Jbe cautious, of objecting to ivhat has 
been api-ilauded by so many suffrages. South is one of the 
best, if you except his peculiarities, and his violence, and 
sometimes coarseiiess of language. Seed has a very fine 
style : but he is not very theological. Jortin's sermons are 
very elegant. Sherlock's style, too, is very elegant, though 
he has not made it his principal study. And you may add 
Smalridge. All the latter preachers have a good style. In- 
deed, nobody now talks much of style : every body composes 
pretty well. I should recommend Dr. Clarke's sermons, were 
he orthodox. However, it is very Avell known where he is 
not orthodox, which was upon the doctrine of the Trinity, as 
to which he is considered a heretic : so one is aware of it." 

Boswell. — "I like Ogden's sermons on Prayer very much, 
both for neatness of style, and subtilty of reasoning." 

Johnson. — " I should like to read all that Ogden has 
written." 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 143 

BoswELL. — '• What I wish to know is, what sermons 
afford the best specimen of English pulpit eloquence." 

Johnson. — " We have no sermons addressed to the pas- 
sions that are good for any thing : if you mean that kind of 
eloquence." 

A Clergyman (whose name I do not recollect). — " Were 
not Dodd's sermons addressed to the passions ?" 

Johnson. — " They were nothing, sir, be they addressed to 
what they may." 

Bishop Atterbury, as an adherent, in his heart, of the Pre- 
tender, a maintainer of the use and rights of Convocation, 
and as a supporter of Sacheverel, and drawing on himself 
the opposition of Hoadley, would certainly find favor in John- 
son's eyes ; but still, though a man of too ardent and haughty 
a disposition, he was accounted an eloquent preacher, and, 
next to Smalridge, one of the finest Latin writers of his time. 
He was both a learned and a brilliant man. The severity 
with which he was treated when the charge of high treason 
(too justly) was brought against him, and the rigorous treat- 
ment which was continued toAvard him in his banishment, 
though Pope hoped that Providence had appointed him to 
some great and useful work (of genius rather than politics), 
and called him to it in this severe way, could not but call 
forth the commiseration of the multitude with whom he was 
popular, as well as the cordial sympathy of the learned and 
more accomplished of mankind. The spirit of Atterbury is 
still, in some degree, in the Church of England, and best 
represented, perhaps, by the able and undaunted Bishop of 
Exeter (Dr. Philpotts), a man supposed by the thoughtless 
to lean toward the Church of Rome, but, like Atterbury, when 
tempted by the doctors of the Sorbonne, ready to take up the 
gauntlet on the condition that the Bible should be taken for 
the sole and ultimate rule of decision. It was a brother of 
the bishop (Lewis Atterbury) who answered the attack of 
Colson (a Roman Catholic) on the Discourses against Pop- 
ery by Archbishop Tillotson, so that both the brothers, as high 
churchmen, were learned and stanch Protestants. 

Johnson qualifies his observations on Archbishop Tillotson, 
though elsewhere he complains of his " verbosity." Correct 



144 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

writers would not be pleased with the style of Tillotson, 
though his argument and matter are so valuable. In Sir 
Thomas Fitzosborne's Letters* (the real author of which 
was William Melmoth, famed for elegant diction), exception 
is taken to the archbishop's ill-chosen words, inharmonious 
periods, and mean metaphors ; this author regretting that 
" he who abounds with such generous and noble sentiments, 
should want the art of setting them off with all the advant- 
age they deserve." Still his sermons are a great storehouse 
of divinity, calculated to convince the skeptic, arm the Pro- 
testant, and confirm the Christian. 

Tillotson, politically and theologically speaking, may be 
accounted the very opposite of Atterbury. He, the early 
nonconformist (and friend of Bishop Wilkins, brother-in-law 
of Cromwell, so anxious to comprehend dissenters within the 
pale of the church), who was promoted by King William ; 
who wrote, " I thank God I have lived to have my last 
desire in this world, which was this happy 'Revolution; who 
succeeded a retiring non-juror on the throne of Lambeth ; 
who wished the church were well rid of the Athanasian 
Creed : between such a one and the Bishop of Rochester 
there could be little agreement ; and hence we find the 
whole of that party who would, in later times, have fol- 
lowed Atterbury, pronouncing Tillotson to be a schismatic, 
and pursuing him with hatred and scurrilous language, even 
to his death. All this he bore with remarkable mildness • 
and there seems to have been in him a notable union of 
intellectual power with natural sweetness of disposition. His 
moderation and sober arguments converted the Earl of 
Shrewsbury to Protestantism. " I am, and always was, more 
concerned," he says, " that your lordship should continue a 
virtuous and good man, than become a Protestant ; being 
assured that the ignorance and errors of men's understanding 
will find a much easier forgiveness with God, than the faults 
of their will." Now that all party prejudices of that time 
have passed away, as regards their personal application, Til- 
lotson's works are reaping their due and just reward ; and 

* Letters on Several Subjects, by Sir Thomas Fitzosborne, Bart. 
Letter 24. 



DR. JOHNSON'S OHURCHMANSHIP. 145 

though it may not be desirous always to imitate his stjde, 
yet who would not wish to possess one tithe of his vast 
powers of reasoning and subhmity in morals, as well as sound 
Christian teaching displayed in his discourses ? He shone 
as a preacher, and is said, more than any other preacher of 
reputation, to have been the means of establishing in the 
Church of England the habit of delivering written sermons. 
Atterbury was born about seven years after the decease of 
this archbishop. 

Dr. South, in part a contemporary of Atterbury, was boru 
thirty-four years previous to the death of Tillotson. These 
divines are taken, not in chronological, but in order as spoken 
of by Dr. Johnson. Dr. Johnson especially recommended 
his sermons on Prayer. Some sentences in these resemble 
Johnson's style ; for instance, where he is speaking on brevity 
of expression in prayer, especially since the Almighty can 
anticipate our wants : " For," he says, " according to the 
most natural interpretation of things, this is to ascribe to him 
a sagacity so quick and piercing, that it were presumption to 
inform, and a benignity so great, that it were needless to 
importune him." In this discourse he uses his more homely 
way, and says : " It is a common saying, If a man does not 
know how to pray, let him go to sea, and that will teach 
him :" and again, he speaks of a man talking of storms, 
shipwrecks, &c., when " safe and warm in his parlor ;" 
though he finishes this discourse with elegant conciseness : 
" And I know no prayer necessary," he says, " that is not in 
the Liturgy, but one ; which is this. That God would vouch- 
safe to continue the Liturgy itself in use, honor, and venera- 
tion, in this church forever." 

Never was there such a slashing preacher as South ; he 
was as the Picton or the Murat of the ecclesiastical army. 
Determined to read the proscribed Prayer Book when he 
was at Oxford, in vain was Cromwellian discipline brought 
against him, in vain did the Independent dean of his college 
attempt to withstand his fearless and sarcastic answers. No 
man was more rude and violent in controversy, whether in 
opposition to Sherlock, or to the disputing fanatics, whom he 
ridiculed and detested, always accounting them to be wolves 

G 



146 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

in sheep's clothing' ; and yet we are told, that he was sin- 
cerely and humbly pious, and passed much time in private de- 
votion, ever fearing a return to popery and arbitrary govern- 
ment. How possible is it for men themselves to be most 
arbitrary in their opposition to arbitrary measures ! His 
unrivaled abilities made his preaching popular, and never in 
any man's life could more exuberant zeal have been dis- 
played. He was another Atterbury in politics and theology, 
with still greater power, still more aggressive spirit. He 
minced not matters, and with the puritanical religionists of 
the age he waged undying war. Much to his honor, he 
refused preferment over and over again. He was offered an 
archbishopric in Ireland, and decliued ; he would not succeed 
one of the deprived bishops in England ; he refused the 
bishopric of Rochester (which Atterbury accepted), with the 
deanery of Westminster. Johnson has well described South's 
style, but, perhaps, the very defects alluded to won him an 
immense popularity ; and very many would thiuk that we 
need his bold and unsparing manner in this our smoother 
day. Altogether, notwithstanding his brilliant powers, his 
was not the mind and heart that the Liturgy of the Church 
of England is calculated to form and cherish, for he lacked 
the calmness, and sweetness, and largeness which are its char» 
acteristics : like the mild Melancthon, it is ivords and mat- 
ter.^ It must be recollected that South lived in a day when 
men most arrogantly laid claim to the teaching of the Spirit — 
when "to be book-learned and to be ix'religious, were almost 
terms convertible ;" and when a vulgar fanaticism led the 
multitude to prefer the discoursing of ignorant men, who 
were " able to make a pulpit before they preached in it."t 

* " It is reported, that in the house of worthy Mr. Luther," says 
Bishop Hall, " was found written, ' Melancthon was words and matter ; 
Luther matter without words; Erasmus words without matter.' " 

t Dr. South, although not greatly liking the constitution of the state 
as prevailing in his time — for he acknowledged the legality of the suc- 
cession only as determined by necessity, when James had withdrawn — 
yet was a strenuous supporter of the union of church and state, 
preaching from tlie significant text of 1 Kings xiii. 33, 34, and largely 
quoting Scripture in favor of his views. In this discourse, he charac- 
erLstically says, for it comes well from one who refused so much 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCH MANS HIP. 147 

In these days of education and general enlightenment we are 
escaping from such absurdities, and for the article of religion 
we go rather to the studies of the most learned and discreet. 
At the same time, there must be no display of learned 
subtlety and curious interpretation, for those who are hunger- 
ing for the plain and common bread of life, or the complaints 
of M. de Sorbierre against Clement the Ninth, for sending 
him compliments rather than substantial aid in his necessi- 
ties, may be realized. " He sends," he says, " sweetmeats to 
one who wants sohd food ! ruffles to a man that has never 
a shirt I I wish to Heaven that he would but allow me 
bread, to eat with the butter which he presents me with." 
Jortin and Sherlock are still much read by common readers 
of divinity. Of the former we are told,* that though there 
may be many writers " whose reputation is more difiused 
among the vulgar and illiterate, but few will be found whose 
names stand higher than Dr. Jortin's in the esteem of the 
judicious. His Latin poetry is classically elegant; his dis- 
courses and dissertations, sensible, ingenious, and argumenta- 
tive ; his sermons replete with sound sense and rational mo- 
rality, expressed in a style simple, pure, and Attic." He 
was remarkable for "a simplicity of manners, an inoffensive 
behavior, and universal benevolence, candor, modesty, and 
good sense." He was Ibnd of a laconic mode of speech, and 

great preferment, "It is a sad thing when all other employments shall 
empty themselves into the ministry, when men shall repair to it for 
refuge." And he again speaks : " Religion in a great measure stands 
or falls according to the abilities of those who assert it." And just 
before, in his accustomed manner, he had thus jocosely treated his dis- 
senting brethren : " The ignorant have took heart to venture upon this 
great calling ; and instead of cutting their way to it, according to the 
usual course, through the knowledge of the tongues, the study of phi- 
losophy, school divinity, the fathers and councils, they have taken 
another and a shorter cut ; and having read, perhaps, a treatise or two 
upon ■ The Heart,' ' The Bruised Reed,' ' The Crumbs of Comfort,' 
' Wollebius in English,' and some other little authors — the usual furni- 
ture of old women's closets — they have set forth as accomplished 
divines, and forthwith they present themselves to the service ; and there 
have not been wanting Jeroboams as willing to consecrate and receive 
them, as they to offer themselves." 

* Essa3's, Moral and Literary, by Vicesimus Knox, vol. ii. p. 115, 
2d edition. 



148 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHxMANSHir. 

being once asked by a clergyman why he did not publish his 
sermons, " They shall sleep," he replied, " till I sleep." His 
last words iir the hour of death were significant, when, in 
answer to a female attendant who offered him some nourish- 
ment, he said, with great composure, "No; I have had 
enough of every thing." Sherlock we may call more than 
elegant ; he is argumentative in his occasional discourses, as 
well as in those on Prophecy, and awful in his book on 
Death. Yet we know not which of the Sherlocks' writings 
Dr. Johnson here alludes to, the father or son, though the 
latter was his contemporary, and probably the one meant ; 
but both were controversial : the former carried on a con- 
troversy with South respecting the doctrine^ of the Trinity, 
and also successfully exposed the Puritans ; and the son with 
Bishop Hoadley in defense of the Corporation and Test Acts ; 
and the practical compositions of both are much admired : 
the latter especially is considered as affording one of the best 
patterns of English pulpit eloquence. "You may add Smal- 
ridge," remarks Johnson ; and a worthy addition too. A 
more exact scholar than Atterbury, and taking the same line 
of politics, he lacked his bold and furious energy. No man 
could be more careful than he was to preserve the golden 
mean between Romanism and Dissent, and this is amply 
proved if we only refer to his very discreet and considerate 
discourse on Religious Ceremonies, in which, while he greatly 
lauds the Reformation because it restored such matters to 
their primitive simplicity and pure intention, he yet candidly 
says : "In the Romish religion there are some things evil, 
some things good, some things wholly indifferent." And 
truly does he aver, that if it be laid down as a good rule of ref- 
ormation, that we must depart as far as possible from Rome, 
we must o-enounce the articles of our Creed, because they of 
that church profess to believe them ; we must declare our- 
lelves Socinians that we may be thought stanch Protest- 
ants ; and we must renounce the doctrine of the Trinity, 
because it is held by those who do also hold that of Tran- 
substantiation. This agrees well with the matchless Hooker, 
who says, " They which measure religion by dislike of the 
Church of Rome, think every man so much the more sound, 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 149 

by how much he can make the corruptions thereof to seem 
more large."* In the present day there is much vitupera- 
tion of the E,oman Catholic belief, indeed it stands forth too 
prominently in lieu of those sound arguments against the 
Church of Rome which every Protestant should as mildly 
and firmly, as he may legitimately, use. What good pur- 
pose have fierce denunciations ever subserved ? and what 
evil purposes have they not subserved ? Will Roman Catho- 
lics be converted by wholesale anathemas directed against 
their faith ? or will Church of England Protestantism gain 
by such virulence and such rhetoric ? No, he who should 
admire the scolding would be as unworthy as the scolder, and 
his conversion, further than mere change of opinion, would 
not be worth recording in the Reformed Church. No persons 
miss their aim so thoroughly and so frequently as those who 
deal in abuse rather than in reasoning, who exhibit a knowl- 
edge of religion in the head, but no practical holding of it 
in the heart. " The Scripture philosophy is, says Alexander 
Knox, " that there are no right actions where there are no 
right tempers :" and he describes a Roman Catholic, of whom 
he says, " I never heard, nor could expect to hear, any Ro- 
man Catholic speak more the language, and breathe more 
the spirit, of unfeigned Christian charity." t In short, he 
desired to do all he could to promote and cherish Christian 
sympathy. This conduct, of course, had a pleasing effect 
on Knox ; and such a temper on the part of Protestants 
would, in a similar manner, affect the hearts of Pi-oman 
Catholics. Ogden he praised more than once, but somehow 
or other, he often took up his sermons, and as quickly laid them 
down, although he expressed a desire to become acquainted 
with all his works. He was a Church of England divine, 
and an elegant writer, and acute reasoner. 

" I prevailed on Dr. Johnson," says Boswell, " to read 
aloud Ogden's sixth Sermon on Prayer, which he did with a 
distinct expression, and pleasing solemnity. He praised my 
favorite preacher, his elegant language, and remarkable 
acuteness ; and said, he fought infidels with their own weap- 

* Ecclesiastical Polity, vol. ii. p. 460. 
t Knox's Correspondence, vol.ii. p. 33. 



150 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

ons." ]n this sermon, which is a very short one, he advo- 
cates the doctrine of Free-will, saying : " Can we suppose the 
Supreme Being thus violently to invade His own works, and 
overrule the minds of His creatures, whom He hath made 
free ? where, henceforth, is their blame or merit ? and 
where His justice?"* Johnson afterward said, "I should 
like to read all that Ogden has written." In Sermon II. 
on the Articles of Faith, he has this admirable sentence : 
" We stand disputing and quarreling about the religion of 
Nature and Revelation, but regard neither much further 
than the mere profession : zealots for a system which has 
no effect on our heart or life : contending each ivith eager- 
ness for the articles of his faith ; agreeing, on both sides, to 
forget the duty of it." Bishop Halifax, who edits the 
Sermons of Ogden, speaks of the fifth discourse on the Arti- 
cles of Faith, which was preached before a learned auditory 
at Cambridge, as an " elegant representation of the dialectic 
genius of the Platonic school." Dr. Ogden, according to 
the account given of him by Bishop Halifax, was a most 
humane and tender-hearted man, though of rustic address 
and stern aspect. During the latter part of his life he labor- 
ed under much ill-health, but endured all his illness with cheer- 
fulness, for " he was fully resigned to the disposals of Provi- 
dence, and full of the hopes of happiness in a better state." 

The interest that Dr. Johnson took in the melancholy 
affairs of Dr. Dodd is well known to every reader of Bos- 
well's Life ; and probably that excellent paper, in the 
Rambler, on capital punishments, was written with the fate 
of poor Dodd in his view. This minister was a popular and 
fashionable preacher ; and popularity and fashion are snares 
at all times, in all cases, but peculiarly so to the preacher. 
Horace Walpole, on one occasion, admired him in this 
capacity, saying that he harangued "very eloquently and 
touchingly," and his sermon, altogether, " a very pleasing 
oerformance ;" it was difficult to extort praise of this kind 
from such a man. His idea of a preacher (and, too often, a 
true one) was identical with that of an actor ; for of Whit- 
field he said, "Lord Chesterfield, Lord Bath, Lady Townsend, 
* Vo). i. p. 63, 4th edit, of Sermons by Dr. Samuel Ogden, 1788. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 151 

Lady Thanet, and others, have been to hear him ; nor jshall 
I wonder if next winter he is run after instead of Garrick .'" 
Of Wesley, too : " Wesley is a clean, elderly man, fresh 
colored, his hair smoothly combed, but with a little soiipgori 
of curl at the ends ; wondrous clever, but as evidently an 
actor as Garrick." While of his sermon he says, " There 
were parts and eloquence in it ; but toward the end he 
exalted his voice, a7id acted very vulgar enthusiasm.'''' The 
epithets of "wondrous clever" must have been quite as inap- 
propriate to Wesley as the charge of mere acting. Dr. Dodd 
had probably much of the actor about him ; and we may 
suppose that Dr. Johnson would neither like his manner nor 
the matter of his sermons, neither did he think well of his 
character ; so that the very great trouble which he went 
through in his behalf redounds the more to the credit of his 
extraordinary humanity ; indeed, misfortune at once insured 
the sympathy and kind efforts of Dr. Johnson. In one case 
he thought well of Dodd's honesty ; for when this man's friends 
were attempting to console him by saying that he was going 
to leave " a wretched world," he had honesty enough not to 
join in the cant. " No, no," said he, " it has been a very 
agreeable world to me." Johnson added, " I respect Dodd 
for thus speaking the truth." 

Another batch of divines and laity came under Johnson's 
criticisms, Sir John Hawkins tells us : " Hooker he admired 
for his logical precision, Sanderson for his acuteness, and 
Taylor for his amazing erudition ; Sir Thomas Browne for 
his penetration, and Cowley for the ease and unaffected 
structure of his periods. The tinsel of Sprat disgusted him, 
and he could but just endure the smooth verbosity of Tillot- 
son. Hammond and Barrow he thought involved : and of 
the latter, that he was unnecessarily prolix." 

Croker thinks it may be doubted whether Hawkins has 
accurately preserved the characteristic qualities which John- 
son attributed to these illustrious men ; and certainly, those 
best acquainted with their writings may justly hold the same 
opinion. 

Of Hooker, " this meek, this matchless man," as Isaac 
Walton calls him, him of the dove-like temper, little need be 



152 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

paid, for his works are patent to all mankind, and we can not 
conceive the age or state of the world when they will not 
be read, and the man himself be " freshly remembered." 
" There are in them such seeds of eternity," observed the 
Pope to Dr. Stapleton, " they shall last till the last fire shall 
consume all learning."* He possessed, truly, a quiet and 
capacious soul. And how mildly does he, the foremost con- 
troversialist, the opponent of the eloquent and more impetuous 
Travers, say of himself, " I take no joy in striving ; I have 
not been trained up in it :" and again, he prays, " that no 
strife may ever be heard of again, but this, who shall hate 
strife most, also shall pursue peace and unity with swiftest 
paces." And " how mournful," he observes, " is that saying 
of Gregory Nazianzen, ' The only godliness we glory in, is to 
find out somewhat whereby we may judge others to be un- 
godly I Each other's faults we observe, as matters of ex- 
probation, and not of grief " It is a great comfort that the 
writings of Hooker, unlike those of South or Atterbury, may 
be placed in the hands of dissenters without the least likeli- 
hood of giving offense to the most sensitive or querulous, just 
as we would put Sir Isaac Newton's works in the way of 
those who might not comprehend the wisdom of his dis- 
coveries. And no man should lift his voice against the 
church, or any ceremony or custom of the church, until he 
has first read and weighed in his mind the arguments of 
Hooker : to do otherwise would be manifestly unfair and in- 
judicious. Far more than mere " logical precision" is to be 
admired in the pages of the Ecclesiastical Polity, and well 
doth the modern poet f sing of him, 

"Voice of the meekest man ! 
Now, while the church for combat arms, 

Calmly do thou confirm her awful ban ; 
Thy words to her be conquering, soothing charms." 



* It was said of Padre Paulo, Sir Henry Wotton's (when embassador 
to the state of Venice) dear friend, and the man whom Bishop Sander- 
son desired to see, " as one of the late miracles of general learning, 
prudence, and modesty" — one who was of invincible bashfulness, that 
he was "a man whose fame must never die, till virtue and learning 
shall become so useless as not to be regarded." — Walton'' s Livct. 

t Isaac Williams, a true sacred poet. See " The Cathedral." 

^. 



m 



DR. JOHNSOxN'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 153 

The events of Sanderson's life would have caused hi^ to 
be a friend of Johnson's, and, like Johnson himself, he was 
in great poverty while writing some of his noblest compositions. 
We are told of his biographer meeting him " accidentally in 
London, in sad-colored clothes," at the very time he was 
publishing his "large and bold" preface to his Sermons, a 
grand defense of the Episcopal clergy against the censures of 
the Puritans. He lived in a time when, says the amiable 
Walton, "in London all the bishops' houses were turned to 
be prisons, and they filled with divines that would not take 
the Covenant, or forbear reading Common Prayer," &c. ; 
and when " all the corners of the earth were filled with 
Covenanters, confusion, committee-men, and soldiers, serving 
each other to their several ends, of revenge, or power, or 
profit." In these days there were needless and fierce de- 
bates, about free-will, election, reprobation, predestination, anti- 
christ, extempore prayers, &c. &c., but very little practice of 
humility, charity, sincerity, and single-heartedness : so that 
Laud well said, " We have lost the substance of religion by 
changing it into opinion ;" and good Isaac Walton writes,* 
" When I look back upon the ruin of families, the bloodshed, 
the decay of common Iwne&ty, and how 'Co.q former inety and 
'plain dealing of this now sinful nation is turned into cruelty 
and cunning, I praise God that He prevented me from being 
of that party which helped to bring in this Covenant, and 
those sad confusions that have followed it." And such would 
be the case again were the candlestick of the church removed 
out of its place. In Wales, at the present time, wherein 
dissent so rampantly prevails, we are told by Her Majesty's 
commissioners, deputed to inquire into the state of education, 
that the people will talk and wrangle for hours on questions 
of baptismal regeneration, election, &c., and yet be mersed 
in the greatest ignorance, and be living in defiance of all 
rules of morality and charity. So that when the Honorable 
Baptist Noel predicts a sort of spiritual millennium for the 
church on its separation from the state, and says,t " Sound 
doctrine will then be heard from most of the Anglican 

* Life of Sanderson, edit. 1823, p. 316. 
t Mr. Noel's Essay, p. 627, &c. 



154 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

pulpits, schisms will be mitigated," &;c., we may beg leave 
to dissent from his prospective views, and, with the pages 
of past history and present evidence before us, rather be- 
lieve that such sound, and hearty, and undefiled religion as 
now prevails in the Church of England, would rarely be 
witnessed again ; and that the old clergy would be found to 
be the Hookers and Sandersons, the meek and matchless men 
of the new times. How often do men disregard the peril of 
extremes ! and thus Sanderson notes it as a thing observed, 
that " in those counties (Lancashire for one) where there are 
the most, and the most rigid Presbyterians, there are also 
the most, and the most zealous Roman Catholics." 

He was a casuistical divine of so much eminence, that 
persons used to resort to him to solve cases of conscientious 
difficulty ; and Charles the First, who was never absent from 
his sermons, would say : "I carry my ears to hear other 
preachers ; but I carry my conscience to hear Mr. Sander- 
son, and to act accordingly :" and when, in his last attend- 
ance, the king requested him to "betake himself to the 
writing cases of conscience for the good of posterity," and he 
answering that "he was now grown too old, and unfit to 
write cases of conscience ;" the king was so bold with him 
as to say : " It was the simplest (taken in the old sense) 
answer he ever heard from Dr. Sanderson ; for no young 
•man was fit to be a judge, or lorite cases of conscience." 
Dr. Johnson himself, it will be remembered by the way, was 
no mean casuist. 

It is supposed, that Sanderson wrote the Preface to the 
Book of Common Prayer, a composition admirable for its 
moderation and just reasoning. But what strikes most in 
the lives of these eminent men who passed their time amid 
so much trouble, opposition, and danger, is the extraordinary 
spirit of kindness and humility with which they were endued ; 
truly showing us that afflictio7i is a divine diet, and that in 
adversity more than in prosperity the soul is confirmed. 
Thus we hear this pious bishop thanking God, " that He 
hath made me of a temper not apt to provoke the meanest 
of mankind :" and we read also with what complacency he 
took the rude and violent conduct of the Parliamentary sol- 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 155 

diers, when they tore the Book of Prayer from him, " pre- 
tending to advise him how God was to be served most ac- 
ceptably." Moreover, how beautiful the story of his com- 
passion for the poor farmer that came to him, and his bountiful 
kindness to the poor, when he could aflbrd them aid : and his 
biographer states, that " his looks and motion manifested 
affability and mildness ;" and speaks of him at the last, as 
" this pattern of meekness and primitive innocence." Closely 
must ho have followed, and in an age of agitation and per- 
sonal vituperation, the exhortation of his sweet contemporary 
Bishop Hall, as quoted from St. Ambrose, " Imitate ye the 
angels, who, though peers of heaven, yet are wont to approve 
themselves miniUering spirits for the poorest of GocVs 
saints: no spectacle can be more odious than a proud pre- 
late." 

Who can sufficiently speak the praises of Jeremy Taylor, 
his universal learning, his charitable disposition ; the Shak- 
speare of the Church of England, whose glory it was to be 
thought a Christian, and who was a zealous son of the Church 
of England, " because he judged her a church the most 
purely Christian of any in the world ?" And he was a 
Christian : such a Christian as Heber, and Wesley, and 
men of piety in all sects, have delighted to follow : and of 
how much eloquent exhortation to religious doctrine and con- 
duct is a man deprived who has not yet drawn from this 
well of purity and learning I He and his little fortune were 
shipwrecked in that great hurricane that overturned both 
church and state ; but in a private corner of the world he 
was fed with manna from heaven. Ere this, it is related 
of his preaching, " he made his hearers take him for some 
young angel, newly descended from the visions of glory ;" 
and after he was a bishop, we read, that " his soul was made 
up of harmony, and he never spake but he charmed his 
hearer." " I believe," says Dr. Rust, his affectionate friend 
and chaplain, " he spent the greatest part of his time in 
heaven : his solemn hours of prayer took up a considerable 
portion of his life;" and, "notwithstanding his stupendous 
parts and learning, and eminency of place, he had nothing in 
him of pride and humor, but was courteous and affable, and 



156 Dll. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

of easy access, and would lend a ready ear to the complaints, 
yea, to the iinpertinencies, of the meanest persons." " The 
Life of Christ," and the " Holy Living" and '^ Ilohj Dy- 
ing" are become household books, most popular as most 
precious : and we can not but think that fiom these, and the 
writings of such like divines, Dr. Johnsou's religious character 
was much assisted in. its formation and subsequent growth. 

The tinsel of Sprat disgusted him ; and yet, in his memoir 
of him, Johnson speaks Avell of his talent. The principles 
of Sprat were perhaps too much of that kind attributed to 
the Vicar of Bray. He stood neuter at a time when he 
should have declared for the church : in turn he eulogized 
Cromwell, and spoke " manfully" for James ; and he had 
to endure much from villains who endeavored to implicate 
him in a pretended con.«piracy. " Burnet was not favorable 
to his memory," says Johnson, " for he was jealous of the 
congregational approbation awarded him." As the Iriend of 
Bishop Wilkins, and author of the " History of the Royal 
Society," as well as of the " Life of Cowley," he is best 
laiown, while his " Sermons" are almost forgotten. 

Hammond and Barrow he thought " involved," but still 
both of these are great names in the church ; the one argu- 
mentative and close, the other profound, and showing a vast 
reach of mind, prolix as regards the repetition of hard and 
earnest words. The early part of Hammond's life, when 
incumbent of Penshurst, where he became, according to 
Bishop Fell, a perfect model of the English country parson, 
was pleasant and undisturbed ; but after that he had become 
the steady and afiectionate chaplain of Charles the First, he 
became involved in the troubles, anxieties, and deprivations 
that awaited the faithful adherents of that unfortunate mon- 
arch. His principles were strict Church of England, and 
when he saw the Romish missionaries successful in drawing 
many " to a pompous and imperious church abroad from an 
afflicted one at home," then he wrote able treatises against 
them ; while, on the other hand, when the errors of con- 
flicting Protestant sects, by the charm of novelty, drew in 
many of the rash and ignorant, then his exertions were 
directed against that opposite quarter oii schismatic action. 



DR. JOHNSOxN'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 157 

Like Dr. Johnson, he wrote whole articles without ever 
raising his pen from the paper till they were finished : in 
such manner he wrote his famous tract on Episcopacy/, begun 
after ten o'clock at night, and sent to press the next morn- 
ing : and also his tract on Scandal, commenced at eleven 
o'clock, and finished before he went to bed. His best known 
work is his Amiotations, so frequently consulted by all com- 
mentators : and we are told that his elocution was free and 
graceful ; King Charles, no mean judge, giving him the 
character of being " the most natural orator he had ever 
heard." The bitter and fierce Presbyterian, Cheynell, he 
who delivered that barbarous oration over the remains of 
Chillingworth, was his opponent ; whose mind was the re- 
verse of the rational, calm, and manly one of this learned 
doctor, whose pure and active spirit, we are informed, was 
becomingly lodged in a body remarkable for beauty and 
strength. 

Hammond just lived to witness the Restoration, but seem- 
ed unwilling to exchange his adversity and affliction for the 
coming events of joy and prosperity. His serene mind 
jumped not at the advantages of a high station and large 
responsibility ; on the contrary, he said, " I never saw the 
time in all my life wherein I could so cheerfully say my 
Nunc Dimittis as now." Soon he died a saint-like death, 
but a few minutes before his departure breathing out these 
words, "Lord, make haste !" 

Barrow, whom the historian Hallam esteems to be second 
in learning only to Taylor, ought to have been a prime favor- 
ite with Dr. Johnson. He was, corporeally and mentally, 
the stalwart scholar. So pugnacious was he at school, that 
his father used to say, that if it pleased God to deprive him 
of either of his sons, he hoped it would be Isaac ! Unlike 
Hammond, the early part of his life was hardy and adventur- 
ous. He traveled extensively, and at Constantinople, the 
See of Chrysostom, he read the works of that " golden mouth," 
whom he preferred to all the other Fathers. In this voyage 
his fighting qualities were called into vigorous action, for the 
ship was attacked by a corsair, and Barrow left not the deck 
till the pirate was beaten back. On his return, the ship in 



158 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

which he sailed took fire, and, with its cargo, was utterly 
consumed, but no lives were lost. He visited Paris, Florence, 
Leghorn, Smyrna, Constantinople, Venice, Germany, Holland, 
&;c., a grand tour indeed in those times. He possessed great 
learning, derived from the best sources, and his eloquence in 
the pulpit was brilliant. He had one fault, " if it deserves 
that name," says Dr. Pope, " he was generally too long in 
his sermons ;" he preached three hours and a half on bounty 
to the poor ; " and now," he adds, " I have spoken as ill of 
him as the worst of his enemies could, if ever he had any.^^ 
Charles the Second called him " an unfair preacher," because 
he left nothing for those that came after him to say ; in fact. 
he liked to treat thoroughly on any subject he took in hand, 
He was a man of the purest morals, and gentlest manners, 
ever despising riches and honors, and such things as might 
have fallen to his lot in these more prosperous times, and 
which so many other men covet and desire. He was care- 
less and slovenly in his person, even in the pulpit : very se- 
vere to himself, "unmercifully cruel to a lean carcass, not 
allowing it sufficient meat or sleep :" and at last, though 
Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, yet he died in mean 
lodgings at a saddler's near Charing Cross, an old, low, ill- 
built house, which he had used for several years, continuing the 
same erudite and humble-minded person all through life. His 
treatise on the Pope's Supremacy, and his Sermons and Ex- 
positions, are of lasting fame. If Johnson had been questioned 
on the merits of these divines, his criticisms would, we may 
think, have done them ample justice : and it is not fair to 
receive, as his judgment, an extemporaneous conversation, 
probably inaccurately reported. 

Come we to a trio of "immortals." When talking of the 
Irish clergy, he said, " Swift was a man of great parts, and 
the instrument of much good to his country ; Berkeley was a 
profound scholar, as well as a man of fine imagination ; but 
Ussher," he said, "was the great luminary of the Irish 
church : and a greater," he added, " no church could boast 
of, at least in modern times." 

Unlike Jeremy Taylor, who " was a man long before he 
was of age," Swift was backward in learning during his early 



DR. JOHNSON'S OHURGHMANSHIP. 150 

youth. Tlie histoiy of this extraordinary man, witli a char- 
actor and genius most puzzUiig, need not be entered upon here, 
since it is given by Johnson himself in a volume so easily pro- 
cured. His '* Church of England Man" was, in some degree, 
a picture of himself His "Tale of a Tub" of which Bishop 
Smalridge, when Dr. Sacheverel complimented him on being 
the author, said, " Not all that you and I have in the world, 
nor all that ever we shall have, should hire me to write The 
Tale of a Tub" — of this book. Dr. Johnson doubts whether 
Swift was really the author, although, when the belief of its 
authorship stood in they way of his becoming a bishop, he 
contradicted it not. Johnson says, speaking of the style, 
" What is true of that, is not true of any thing else which he 
has written." It is certain, however, that it is his produc- 
tion. 

To his duties, as a clergyman, he was attentive, and put 
many things in order in his church which were before neglect- 
ed. He complained of himself, that from the time of his po- 
litical controversies " he could only preach pamphlets," a com- 
plaint, observes Johnson, which was " unreasonably severe," 
if we may judge from those sermons which have been print- 
ed. The suspicions of his irreligion, we are told, arose from 
his dread of hypocrisy, and thus, in London, he went to early 
prayers, lest he should be seen at church ; and read prayers 
to his servants every morning " with such dextrous secrecy, 
that Dr. Delany was six months in his house before he knew 
it." " He Avas not only careful," continues Johnson, " to 
hide the good which he did, but willingly incurred the suspi- 
cion of evil which he did not ;" and it is somewhat disingenu- 
ously added, the sentiment being open to much animadver- 
sion, " he forgot what himself had formerly asserted, that 
hypocrisy is less mischievous than open impiety." We must 
not suppose from this remark that his memory was deficient, 
for, though Pope says, 

" Where beams of warm imagination play, 
The memory's soft figures melt away." 

He was blessed with an astounding memory ; so much so, as 
to be able to repeat the lines of Hudibras from the beginning 



IGO DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

to the end. He was a man of great humanity, but always 
fidgety during meal times ; the meat was always too much 
or too little done, or the servants ofiended in a manner not 
perceptible to the rest of the company, nor did he spare the 
servants of others. Once when he dined alone with the 
Earl of Orrery, he said of one that waited in the room, 
" That man has, since we sat at table, committed fifteen 
faults." Lord Ori'ery had not perceived them. Yet after 
dinner, he was himself again : and, always temperate in 
drinking, the feast of reason and the flow of soul were in full 
exuberance : his wit and learning, his humor and warmth 
of afiection, informing, extracting from, and winning all. It 
is singular that he, our English Rabelais, whose bon mots 
exist in constant conversational quotation to this day, and 
whose name is so familiar, as connected with dry and droll 
sayings, among members of nearly all classes of people, should 
himself have "stubbornly resisted any tendency to laughter," 
and possessed a countenance " sour and severe, which he 
seldom softened by any appearance of gayety," while his 
writings abound in ludicrous ideas, and his reputation for 
hunaor and wit was at once universally famous and infamous. 
Bishop Berkeley was indeed a profound scholar, and one 
who has adorned the scientific character of this country. 
He is said to have been acquainted with almost all branches 
of human knowledge, and his character commanded the respect 
and love of all who knew him. Pope, his constant friend, 
describes him as possessed " of every virtue under heaven." 
His disinterestedness in endeavoring to establish a College in 
the Bermuda Islands for the conversion of the American 
savages to Christianity, and his patience in waiting in vain 
for the promised aid of Parliament, were most laudable. 
Johnson, who imperfectly apprehended tho bishop's subtle 
reasoning, being in company with a gentleman who thought 
fit to maintain Dr. Berkeley's ingenious philosophy, that noth- 
ing exists but as perceived by some mind : when the gentle- 
man was going away, Johnson said to him, " Pray, sir, don't 
leave us ; for we may perhaps forget to think of you, and tJien 
you icill cease to exist." Another time he confuted Berkeley's 
idea of non-existence of matter, by stamping vigorously on 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 161 

the ground ; and, in short, he seems to have been some- 
what of the opinion so flippantly expressed by the modern 
poet, 

" When Bishop Berkeley said thei-e was no matter, 
In truth it was no matter what he said." * 

Certainly his hypothesis, that those things which are called 
semihle material objects are not external, but exist in the 
mind, is an enigma to the non-metaphysical student, and is 
supported by an ingenuity which it is difficult to refute, 
although we think we can so readily deny its truth. Let us 
ask ourselves. What is darkness? What is death? We 
may answer : The absence of light ; the absence of life ; but 
can we consider either darkness or death as real beings ? Can 
the absence of any thing have a real existence ? or nothing be 
as real in natural existence as a^iy thing 1 

Bishop Berkeley's opinion of Atterbury, we may understand 
sooner than the arcana of his metaphysics, namely, that he 
was " a most learned, fine gentleman, who under the softest 
and politest appearance concealed the most turbulent ambi- 
tion." 

Archbishop Ussher was another of those great and good 
men who were sorely afflicted during political and ecclesias- 
tical periods of trouble and dismay. He was born near the 
time that the excellent Sir Henry Sidney wrote to Queen 
Elizabeth, "that upon the face of the earth, where Christ is 
professed, there is not a church" (he means that of Ireland) 
"in so miserable a case :" yet, when he was but eighteen 
years of age, at his father's death, he made over the paternal 
estate, which was considerable, to his younger brother, and 
himself studied for the ministry of the church. He Avas 
always of a Calvinistic turn of mind, caught from the prevail- 
ing temper of the age : his notions also of church government 
verging toward Presbyterianism, his enemies, taking advantage 
of this, sought to undermine his credit with James the First. 
But no, he was always a steady Church of England man, 
supporting the kingly supremacy ; and on coming to England 

* Is not this an okl play of words borrowed from a paper called the 
Connoisseur ? 



162 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

on one occasion, he Avas furnished with testimonials to the 
king by the Lord Deputy and Council, in which he was de- 
scribed as "abounding in goodness, and his life and doctrine 
so agreeable, that those who agree not with him are constrain- 
ed to admire him." He wrote against the great republican 
poet, Milton : he endeavored to prevent Charles the First 
from sacrificing Lord Straflbrd, and was the affectionate friend 
and pious counselor of that lamented nobleman to the last : 
he carried the message to Laud by which the archbishop, from 
his prison window, was enabled, with uplifted hands, to bless 
Strafford on his way to death : and he was in such an agony 
at the sight of King Charles on the scaffold, as to be unable 
to bear the affecting scene any longer.* These are circum- 
stances in his history that would serve to exalt him in the 
eyes of Johnson ; and most steadily, even to the spoiling of 
his goods, and the extreme hazard of his person, did this 
evangelical man of God stand by the church and his king. 
We learn from Evelyn's diary, that he once said to that even- 
minded man, " that the church would be destroyed by secta- 
ries, who would, in all likelihood, bring in Popery." He 
was a supporter of the strenuous rule of Viiicent of Lirins, 
for he says, " We bring in no new faith, no new church. 
That which in the time of the ancient Fathers was account- 
ed to be truly and properly Catholic, viz., that which was 
believed every tvliere, always, and by all : that in the suc- 
ceeding ages hath evermore been preserved, and is in this day 
entirely professed in our church." Well would it be if our 
modern evangelicals (so called), who so cordially give the 

* At a future time, when he was lying ill in his retirement, a mem- 
ber of the Parliament came to visit him, to whom he said in a solemn 
manner : " Sir, you see I am very weak, and can not expect to live 
many hours. You are returning to the Parliament — / am going to God. 
I charge you to tell thcra from me, that I know they are in the wrong, 
and have dealt very injuriously with the king." He always commem- 
orated this sad event by an anniversary celebration of funeral rites. 

The above anecdote brings to one's mind another, of the pious Arch- 
bishop Leighton. When a young man, and a Presbyterian, he attend- 
ed a synod where the clergy were asked if they preached to the times ? 
He being accused of rather not doing so. He replied, " Surely, if all 
of you preach to the times, might not one poor brother be allowed to 
preach for eternity?*' 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHUECHMANSHIP. 163 

right hand of welcome and fellowship to Archbishop Ussher, 
would also embrace, and act according to this large-hearted 
and unsectarian rule. 

The fact is, Ussher was well acquainted with the writings 
of the early Fathers. We are told, that suspecting the ac- 
curacy of a work put forward by a Roman Catholic divine 
(Stapleton), which was accounted a book of very high repute, 
he resolved to read through all the writings of the Fathers ; 
and this laborious task he commenced at the age of twenty, 
and, persevering with a certain portion daily, completed it at 
the time he was thirty-eight. This was of such use to him, 
that it bore him in safety through a controversy with a dis- 
tinguished Jesuit, who courteously styled him " the most 
learned of the non-Catholics." 

He w^as put forward by the clergy to intercede with Crom- 
well for a withdrawal of his cruel and arbitrary declaration 
issued in 1655, but was unsuccessful, Cromwell being advised 
by his council, "that it tvas not safe to grant liberty of con- 
science to those men whom he deemed restless and implacable 
enemies to his government." This refusal greatly affected 
the humane archbishop ; and to his friends, who awaited his 
return, he broke out in severe invectives against the Pro- 
tector, and mournfully predicted the advantage which Popery 
would draw from the confusion in church and state. It is 
just to record, that, on his death, which was calm and re- 
signed, Cromwell ordered that the body should be deposited, 
with public honors, in Westminster Abbey ; and, on the day 
of the funeral, it was met by the clergy and a great con- 
course of the people, who accompanied it, with weeping, to 
the abbey. 

Burnet says, that "he was certainly one of the greatest and 
best men that the age, or perhaps the world, has produced;" 
and describes him as expressing "in his conversation the true 
simplicity of a Christian ; for passion, pride, self-will, or the 
love of the world, seemed not to be so much as in his nature. 
He had a way of gaining people's hearts, and of touching their 
consciences, that looked like somewhat of the Apostolic age 
revived." He effected much for the Irish church, in con- 
jtinction with Bramhall ; and was, indeed, not only its lumin- 



164 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

ary, but of the world also, probably to the end of the time of 
the Christian dispensation. We can not help observing what 
pure, pious, and memorable names are united in deep lament- 
ation on the death of Charles the First ; and we can 
imagine that Ussher himself might have mournfully and em- 
phatically exclaimed, 

" I saw a royal form with eye uptnrn'd, 

Rising from furnace of affliction free, 

And knew that brow of deep serenity, 
Whereon, methought, a crown of glory burn'd, 
With a calm smile, as if the death-cry turned 

On his freed ear to seraph sounds on high !" * 

As commentators, Dr. Johnson recommended Lowth and 
Patrick on the Old Testament, and Hammond on the New. 
The attempt of the former to show a manifest conformity be- 
tween the prophetical style and that of the books supposed 
to be metrical, has met with the approbation of the learned ; 
and the observations of Patrick are sound and full, frequently 
quoted by Bishop Mant and Dr. D'Oyley in their more com- 
prehensive commentary on the Scriptures. It is gratifying 
to find that Bishop Patrick's " Parable of the Pilgrim" is 
becoming a popular book, for it is at once entertaining and 
instructive. Hammond's Annotations on the Psalms are very 
valuable, and so are those on the New Testament ; but he 
is thought to be mistaken, in some, of his criticisms, by Dr. 
Doddridge, who observes, " he finds the Gnostics every where." 
This leads him to consider Simon Magus as the " Man of 
Sin," and not to regard several denunciations as applying to 
the Church of Rome. We may not believe that Doddridge 
can determine this point more than Hammond, and surely 
the last is the most learned commentator. 

On another occasion. Dr. Johnson commended Whitby's 
Commentary. This is usually accounted to be the best 
upon the New Testament that is existent in the English 
language. He can not view the Church of Rome as con- 
nected with the Man of Sin, but difiers from Hammond, in 
accounting it to be the Jewish nation with their high-priest 
and Sanhedrim. He offers no commentary on the Book of 
* Isaac Williams. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. ]G5 

Revelations, very wisely saying, that he can not understand 
" the intendment of the prophecies." It is to be observed, 
that Calvin also oiTeied no written comment on the Revela- 
tion ; but Dr. South went too far in his love of wit, when 
he averred, "That book either finds a man mad, or makes 
him so." 

In reference to individual divines in more chronological 
order, we find Dr. Johnson speaking favorably, as all relig- 
ious persons must do, of Thomas a Kempis. It " must be a 
good book," he observed, " as the world has opened its arms 
to receive it. It is said to have been printed, in one lan- 
guage or other, as many times as there have been months since 
it first came out. I was always struck with this sentence 
in it, ' Be not angry that you can not make others as you 
wish them to be, since you can. not make yourself as you 
wish to be.' " Yes, and of the same veritably catholic, but 
un-Roman Catholic spirit, is the following admirable sentence, 
which Dr. Johnson, who liked not bitterness in controversy, 
would also have loved : " What will it avail thee to dispute 
profoundly of the Trinity, if thou be void of humanity, and 
thereby displeasing to the Trinity '' High words, surely, make 
a man neither holy nor just ; but a virtuous life maketh him 
dear to God. / Itad rather feel coonpunction, than under- 
stand the definition thereof. If thou didst know the whole 
Bible by heart, and the sayings of all the philosophers, what 
would all that profit thee, without charity, and the grace of 
God ?" Violence in controversy, on ever so just a side, is 
always impolitic, as well as unseemly; hence, very trite was 
the observation of George the Third to Dr. Johnson, on the 
difference between Lowth and Warburton, " Why truly," 
said the king, " when once it comes to calling names, argu- 
ment is pretty well at an end." 

Thomas a Kempis's book is indeed glorious throughout, so 
filled with self-denial, and so spiritual. It is said to be the 
book of largest circulation next to the Bible, and to be found 
in nearly all countries. A Wesleyan Methodist once said to 
to me, " Sir, I owe my conversion to the reading the book of 
Thomas a Kempis ;" but he did not join the communion of 
that church of which his converter was so great an orna- 



166 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

ment; thus wisely showing that we are not bound to tie 
ourselves to those who may first serve to imbue our minds 
with principles of religion. Strange that Dr. Johnson should 
not have more highly esteemed Bossuet, Massillon, and Bour- 
daloue ; he would not allow them "to go round the world." 
And quite as strange, yet worthily liberal, is it, to find the 
Presbyterian Boswell entering his strongest protest against 
Dr. Johnson's judgment in regard to the former: "Bossuet," 
he says, " I hold to be one of the first luminaries of religion 
and literature. If there are loho do not read him, it is full 
time they shotdd hegiji'' 

Of Grotius, the rehgious and political hero of Holland, Dr. 
Johnson entertained a high opinion. He classed him among 
the great men who had embraced the Christian religion as 
the truth, and thus given an additional evidence in its favor. 
" Grotius was an acute man," he said, " a lawyer, a man 
accustomed to examine evidence, and he was convinced." 
Of his writings, he said, " I would recommend to every man 
whose faith is yet unsettled, Grotius, Dr. Pearson, and Dr. 
Clarke." And again : " Richard Baxter commends a treatise 
by Grotius, ' De Satisfactione Christi ;' I have never read 
it, but I intend to read it ; and you (Boswell) may read it." 
And when recommending an old friend (De Groot) to the 
benevolence of the B-ev. Dr. Vyse, he writes, " He is by 
several descents the nephew of Hugo Grotius, of him from 
whom perhaps, every man of leaiming has learned some- 
thing. Let it not be said, that in any lettered country a 
nephew of Grotius asked a charity and was refused. 

A more comprehensive mind than that of Grotius never 
existed ; and this comprehensiveness founded, not on vague, 
iatitudinarian, or reckless opinions, but on the basis of learn- 
ing the most profound, and charity the most enlightened and 
sincere. It is creditable to find his works studied at our En- 
glish universities, and thus our age may well be congratulated 
on its retrospective character. With his political life, 
whether as occupying a high post in the government of his 
country, or as embassador from Sweden to the court of 
France, seconding the views of the renowned Swedish Grand 
Chancellor, Oxenstiern, and disliked by Cardinal Richelieu, 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHir. 167 

we have little now to do ; it is iu his religious character that 
we must regard him. His main aspirations were after an 
universal, an ancient, and a loving church. From every 
school of philosophy, and from every society in the world of 
iopinion, he would gather some important truth, while he 
rejected much prominent or latent error ; and thus to know 
and discern the seminal principle of every prophet and leader 
of a sect, was, with him, to gather the wisdom of the 
world. Such a man, with a mind of this universal and 
truthful grasp, is often looked upon, by the earnest and nar- 
row-minded, as one heedless of principle and undecided. 
Neither Owen nor Baxter could appreciate the elevation or 
amplitude of his religious views, because " he endeavored to 
reunite the fragments of truth scattered among all parties — 
and thus had the honor to displease every party that wished 
to make him its exclusive proselyte."* It could not be de- 
ciphered, whether he were Arminian or Calvinist, or even. 
Papist; and hence the lines, 

" Papists, Lutherans, Arminians, 
Arians, Calvinists, Socinians, 
All contend for Grolius' name, 
All conspire to raise his fanae." 

This is honorable testimony indeed ; and we read, that he 
was disposed to conciliate all the pious Roman Catholics, as 
well as the Protestants, and the more because others were 
endeavoring to augment ecclesiastical divisions. 

It may be well to give an extract or two from his admi- 
rable plea for ecclesiastical peace, which furnished Bossuet 
and Wake with some of their best hints on the project of 
harmonizing the Galilean and British churches, reported at 
the end of Mosheim's Ecclesiastical History. He says that, 
after receiving many lessons from persons who held a great 
variety of doctrines on religious subjects, " I early felt the 
importance of our Saviour's counsel, that all who would be 
called after His name, and who would enjoy beatitude through 
His mediation, should be of one spirit, as He and His Father 

* Barham : who says, "the religion of Grotius," from its toleration, 
" became a problem to many, which Baxter endeavored in vain to 
solve." 



168 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

were one. Nor of one spirit only so far as charity is con- 
cerned, but also as respects the communion of faith and the 
bond of discipline. For the church is, or ought to be one, 
and one body .'" 

Again: "At length I understood more fully, both from 
the books and the conversations of our elders, that men had 
arisen who stated that the Catholic Church and the Protest- 
ant differed altogether in principle no less than in practice ; 
and that these not merely deserted the ancient community 
without endeavoring to bring about reconciliation by the re- 
moval of iingrateful abuses, but some, even before their ex- 
communication, instituted novel congregations, ^chich they 
ventured to nominate churches, and in these appointed new- 
fashioned presbyteries, and administered irregular sacraments, 
and that in many places against all the edicts of kings and 
of bishops, saying, forsootii, by way of defense, that they had 
authority from heaven like the apostles of old, and that 
they ought to obey God rather titan me7i." How often was 
it the case with our own Puritans, that they laid claim to 
sources of power which never could be investigated, and thus 
the well-known pertinent answer of Cromwell to the inquir- 
ing Quaker was richly deserved. 

Grotius complained of the numerous sects of dissenters. 
" So many new dissenters sprung up every day, that no man 
alive would undertake to number or count them. And as 
this new brood is exceeding fruitful, as every one believes he 
has as good a right to coin his own creed as his neighbors 
before him, it is probable that innumerable schismatics will 
yet arise." And how grand is his calm resolve : " All this 
displeased me beyond measure, especially when I saw that 
these new parties carried their vote rather by riotous clamor 
than by any solid argument; a^id so I turned me to the 
reading of such authors who live apart in divine commu- 
nions, devoting their talent rather to heal than to aggra- 
vate our dissensions." 

Erasmus, who was in much the counterpart of Grotius, 
ridicules the number of sects, and their flimsy quiddities and 
reasonings, as existent in the Romish church, such as the 
Realists, the Nominalists, the Thomists. the Albertists, the 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 169 

Occamists, the Scotists,* &c. ; " in each of which there is so 
much of deep learning, so much of unfathomable difficulty, that 
I believe the Apostles themselves would stand in need of a new 
illuminating spirit if they were to engage in any controversy 
with these new divines." These would maintain it to be a 
less aggravating fault to kill a hundred men, than for a poor 
cobbler to set a stitch on the Sabbath day ; these entertain 
one with all kinds of notions, formalities, and abstrusities, 
when the Apostles baptized all nations without ever teach- 
ing what was the formal., inaterial, efficient, and filial cause 
of Baptism ; they administered the Holy Sacrament, and 
yet could give no answer to the terminus a quo, and the 
terminus ad quern, in the nature of Transubstantiation.f 
So difficult is it, within or out of the pale of the church, 
to keep men from setting up their own opinions as of first 
importance, and to preserve them in the fold of a large and 
loving church, without peculiarities, and without divisions. 

Grotius expected, we are told, that his works, which were 
compiled solely with a view to promote union among Chris- 
tians, would procure him many enemies ; and he said, on 
this occasion, " that for jjersons to endeavor to make man- 
kind live in peace was commendable ; that they might indeed 
expect a recompense frona the blessed peace-maker, but that 
they had great reason to apprehend the same fate with those 
who, attempting to part two combatants, receive blows from 
both ; but if it should so happen, I shall comfort myself 
with the example of him who said, ' If I please men, I am 
not the servant of Christ.' " 

Archbishop Bramhall| nobly defends Grotius against the 
insinuations and accusations of Baxter, to the efi^ect that 
under pretense of reconciling the Protestant churches with 
the Roman church, he acted " the coy-duck, willingly, or 
unwillingly, to lead Protestants into Popery." But such 
was far from the case, as proved by the archbishop in oppo- 
sing Baxter's feeble suppositions on this matter of Grotian 
designs. Grotius and Baxter, we understand, both prosecuted 

* Panegyric upon Folly, 5th edit. p. 111. 

t See the whole passage, p. Ill, 112. 

X BramhaU's Works, Oxford edit. vol. iii. p. .505, &c. 

H 



170 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

the same design of reconciliation, but Mr. Baxter's object was 
the British world, and that of Grotius was the Christian 
world ; and the archbishop, speaking of three great writers, 
one of whom was Grotius, says, "I do prefer these three be- 
fore a hundred yawning wishers for peace, while they do 
nothing that tendeth to the procuring of peace." And he 
gives this opinion, which may not be quite so applicable to 
the present times : " Excuse me for telling the truth plainly ; 
many who have had their education among sectaries or non- 
conformists, have apostated to Rome, but few or no right 
episcopal divines. Hot water freezeth the soonest." 

Not all that Grotius held, did Bramhall approve. Of hi» 
book of the Right of the Sovereign Magistrates in Sacred 
Things, he says : " But when I did read it, it seemed to me 
to come too near an Erastian, and to lessen the power of the 
keys too much, which Christ left as a legacy to His Church." 
The high chui'chman here likes not too much exaltation oi 
the union of the state with the church, because he sees that 
the former would take away, in great measure, the power oi 
the latter. Strange, that dissenters should desire to see the 
church uncontrolled by the public opinion embodied in the 
state. And so the archbishop will not pin his religion to any 
of their sleeves, saying : " Plato is my friend, and Socrates is 
my friend, but Truth is my best friend." 

He shows, however, that Grotius " was in affection a friend, 
and in desire a true son of the Church of England ; and upon 
his death-bed recommended that church, as it toas legally 
established, to his wife, and such other of his family as were 
then about bira, obliging them by his authority to adhere 
firmly to it, so far as they had opportunity ;" and after telling 
how they obeyed this injunction, the archbishop says : " If 
any man think, that he knoweth Grotius his mind better by 
conjectural consequences than he did himself, or that he would 
dissemble with his wife and children upon his death-bed, he 
may enjoy his own opinion to himself, but he will find few 
to join with him." 

Henry Newton, embassador extraordinary from the Queen 
of England to the Grand Duke of Tuscany, in his letters to 
Barcelinus, Le Clerc, &c., acquaints us with the attachment 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHUROHxMANSHIP. ]71 

of Grotius to the Church of England, to which church he 
would have openly conformed, had time permitted. He 
thought the more worthily of the Reformation in England, 
" because they who undertook that holy work admitted of 
nothing new, nothing of their own, but had their eyes wholly 
fixed upon another world." He advised his friends in Hol- 
land to take holy orders from our bishops, and desired that 
the Remonstrants should appoint bishops among themselves, 
and receive the laying on of hands " from the Irish archbishop 
who is there," evidently alluding to Bramhall. He writes, 
" The English Liturgy was always accounted the best by all 
learned men :" and also it is said of him by Newton, " Body 
and soul he professeth himself to be for the Church of En- 
gland ; and gives this judgment of it, that it is the likeliest to 
last of any church this day in being."* How satisfied ought 
all members of the Church of England to be, when they find 
the Continental Reformers (Calvin, Beza, «fec., among the 
number), ever envying the episcopal order existing among the 
English Reformers ! and the true secret of the continuance 
and success of the English church is to be found in Jewell's 
resolve : " We undertake to show that the most glorious gos- 
pel of God, and the ancient bishops, and the primitive church, 
are on our side."t 

This is the character given of Grotius by Archbishop Bram- 
hall : "It shall suffice me to say, that he was a person of 
rare parts, of excellent learning, of great charity ; and of so 
exemplary a life, that his fiercest adversaries had nothing to 
object against him of moment, but were forced to rake into 
the faults of his family ; which, whether true or false, was 
not so ingenuously done." And when Baxter softens down in 
regard to Arminian charges against Grotius, and finds in gen- 
eral that " most of our contentions are more about words than 
matter," the archbishop exquisitely says, " I see Truth is the 
daughter of Time." 

There was another great man who appreciated the talents 

* See Le Clerc, at the end of Grotius's " Truth of the Christian 
Religion." 

t Bishop Jewell's " apology," &c., recommended in 30th canon of 
the church. 



172 DR. JOHiNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

and loved the disposition of Grotius, and that man was Mil- 
ton. His Adamus Exul is accounted the drama which laid 
the foundation of our own poet's immortal Paradise Lost. 
Of modern minds those of Guizot and Dr. Arnold seem most 
to be in accordance with his own. Both would unite all that 
is true, quite apart from that iudifferentism which would 
countenance the true in union with that which is false. 
Both have evidently listened to the noble and loving voices 
of Erasmus, Cassander, Calixtus, Leibnitz, and Schlegel, and 
both like him have failed in meeting with a successful issue 
to their comprehensive plans of true fraternization. It ap- 
pears Guizot was not so warm an advocate as Dr. Arnold of 
the union of church and state, for although he thinks France* 
has been the centre from which European civilization has 
emanated, yet he supposes it impossible that the state should 
live according to the example of the church, and that the 
people of the state should be as one with the people of the 
church ; in other words, he thinks, contrary to Arnold, that 
the state would rather secularize the church, than the church 
evangelize the state. This we mention by the way, for in 
fact Grotius, Guizot, and Arnold, would have been a noble 
trio in Christian philosophy, and agreed well in their love of 
social peace and good-will, established on Guizot's admired 
basis — the brotherhood of all men in the faith of Jesus Christ, 
and the equality of all men before God. But " Man," cries 
Cecil, " is a creature of extremes. Few are wise enough to 
find the middle path. Because Papists have made too much 
of some things, Protestants have made too little of them. 
The Popish heresy of human merit in justification, drove 
Luther, on the other side, into most unwarrantable and un- 
scriptural statements of that doctrine. The Papists consider 
grace as inseparable from the participation of the Sacra- 
ments — the Protestants too often lose sight of them as insti- 
tuted means of conveying grace." It is refreshing to find 
earnest and evangelical minds breaking forth in this way, " for 
it is a perilous employment," as Dr. Arnold writes,t " for 

* Lectures on the Progress of Civilization, by M. Guizot. Democ- 
racy and its Mission, by jNI. Guizot. 
t Preface to Sermons, vol. iii. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 173 

any man to be perpetually contemplating narrow-mindedness 
and weakness in conjunction with much of piety and good- 
ness " 

Lately there has sprung up one of Grotian spirit, except 
that he accepts not so fully the teaching of the Church of 
England : yet is he one of an earnest, thoughtful mind, eager 
for coalition. His main error — but then he is a young man — 
seems to be set forth in the idea that truth has not yet ap- 
peared in the world or the churches of the world ; that the 
M'ords " Lo, I am with you alway," ought rather to have 
been, " Lo, I shall be with you some time in the twentieth 
century, and Mr. George Dawson* is to be my pioneer and 
discoverer." But, notwithstanding this intellectual conceit, 
much that he speaks may be loved, and therefore let us hear 
him, when he is descanting on the blessing of unity rather 
than diversity of spirit. " Do we not know," he writes, 
" some families that read none but Baptist books : others, 
none but Unitarian tracts and writings : many who, in their 
narrow notions of sacred literature, study only the prophets 
of their own sect ? They know nothing about others : they 
understand them not : they desire not to understand them. 
Nursed up in their own little, narrow apartment, they walk 
wearily round it, till they have left their footprint upon the 
stone of its floor. Should a wise man be brought up so ? 
Shall I refuse to be taught by the holy words of Fenelon, 
because he belongs not to my sect or creed ? Shall Jeremy 
Taylor have written eloquently, and Chrysostom of the ' gold- 
en mouth' have spoken and preached in vain for me, because 
I belong not to their communion ? Verily, no I I accept with 
thankfulness all the good that God sends me, come from 
where it will. I believe in good men of every church." 

And so did Dr. Johnson, albeit he most loved his own. 
Hear him speak of the next in succession, Dr. Watts. He 

* George Dawson, Esq., M.A. Birmingham, author of " Demands 
of the Age upon the Church." This gentleman, like Southey, ha? 
commenced life as a lecturer^ but whether he will fuither resemble 
Southey, remains yet to be seen. Reading and rcJlecLion are the two 
things that must inform and brace bis mind ; and he must take good 
heed to combat against the idea that he is to be a discoverer of the 
truth, when all the while the truth has been in the world. 



174 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURGHMANSHIP. 

says, " Dr. Watts was one of the first who taught the dis- 
senters to write and speak hke other men, by showing them 
that elegance might consist with piety." Again, when stating 
that he is to be included in the " Lives of the English Poets," 
he adds, " His name has long been held by me in veneration, 
and I would not willingly be reduced to tell of him only that 
he was born and died ;" he therefore desires to be favored 
with every information about him, saying, " I wish to distin- 
guish Watts, a man who never wrote but for a good purpose." 
Doctor Towers, the opponent of Dr. Johnson, says : " His life 
of Dr. Watts is written with great candor : and perhaps he 
might be the more inclined to do justice to that ingenious 
divine, though a dissenter, not only from respect for his piety, 
but also from some grateful remembrance of the assistance 
which he had received from his works in the compilation of 
his Dictionary."* 

By referring to Johnson's memoir of this good man, we 
find how pleasantly thirty-six years of his life were spent 
imder the same roof with the family of Sir Thomas Abney. 
Here, and Pliny might have envied him, " he had the privi- 
lege of a country recess, the fragrant bower, the spreading 
lawn, the flowery garden, and other advantages, to soothe 
his mind and aid his restoration to health." Here he con- 
tinued to write and preach. "He did not endeavor," says his 
biographer, " to assist his eloquence by any gesticulations : 
for, as no corporeal actions have any correspondence with 
theological truth, he did not see how they could enforce it ;" 
and of his writing he says, " Every man acquainted with the 
common principles of human action, will look with venera- 
tion on the writer, who is at one time combating Locke, 
and at another making a Catechism for children in their 
fourth year." Of his poetry, the great critic did not hold 
a high opinion, for he thought there was a difficulty about 
writing sacred poetry hardly to be overcome, therefore, he 
writes, "His devotional poetry is, like that of others, unsat- 
isfactory:" and adds, "It is sufficient for Watts to have done 
better than others ivhat no man has done loell." And how 

* Essay on the Life, Character, and Writings of Dr. Samuel John- 
son, p. 89. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 175 

keenly and truly does Dr. Johnson discern the true orthodoxy 
of character, " It was not only in his book, but in his mind, 
that orthodoxy was united with charity. " The italics are 
his own, and show how he loved love. He concludes by 
wishing the reader " to imitate him in all but his noncon- 
formity, to copy his benevolence to man and his reverence to 
God." Alas, did not his nonconformity extend to a doubt, 
even in his last hours, of the first mystery of faith, the 
Trinity ? Dr. Watts would probably have been the same 
pious, modest, inoffensive man, with whatever communion of 
Christians he had been connected. Indeed, there is much 
of Church of England temper and piety in his character, 
and we might imagine old Isaac Walton applauding the 
meekness of his life. In speaking of a book of Miscellanies 
in prose and verse, to which Watts evidently contributed 
some pieces. Dr. Johnson thus remarkably speaks of two 
(one of them was probably Watts) of the contributors, " They 
would both have done honor to a better society, for they had 
that charity which might well make their failings be forgot- 
ten, and ivith which the whole Christian ivorld wish for 
com'munion. They were pure from all the heresies of an 
age, to which every opinion is become a favorite that the 
U7iiversal chiirch has hitherto detested! Our friend George 
Dawson, and many less illustrious truth-mongers among up- 
start propagandists of modern discoveries, might well ponder 
thoughtfully on this last sentence, ever remembering what 
the immortal Dryden had before written,* 

"But since men will believe more than they need. 
And every man will make himself a creed, 
In doubtful questions 'tis the safest way 
To learn what unsuspected ancients say : 
For His not likely we should higher soar 
In search of heaven, than all the chtivch before . 
Nor can we be deceived, unless we see 
The Scripture and the Fathers disagree." 



* A Layman's Faith. Dryden's Works, vol. i. p. 409. 



CHAPTER XII. 

HIS CHURCHMANSHIP. 

Dr. Johnson recommended " Bishop Bramhall on Liberty 
and Necessity." This is the answer to Hobbes. Predesti- 
nation and free-will were subjects on which Dr. Johnson 
failed in speaking with his wonted positiveaess : he could 
only say, " All theory is against the freedom of the will, all 
experience for it."* Archbishop Bramhall argues that the 
freedom of man is not inconsistent with God's eternal decrees, 
nor with His eternal prescience ; and the following words, ex- 
tracted from a large argument, at once take away much of the 
difficulty of a metaphysical subject, which must still remain, 
not contrary to, but above human reasoning : and therefore it 
is no wonder that we find Dr. Johnson's reverential mind 
retreating from collision with its immense profoundness. But 
hear Bramhall :t "As the decree of God is eternal, so is 
His knowledge ; and therefore, to speak truly and properly, 

* Dr. Shuttlewortli has a fine sermon on this subject : it is the tenth 
in his " Sermons on some of the leading Principles of Christianity." 
This sentence remarkably agrees with Dr. Johnson's opinion, " The 
fact is certain, that, while the instinctive conviction of our breasts 
announces to us that we are free, the tendency of all our metaphysical 
inquiries, all that we can trace scientifically of the origin of our thoughts, 
and the motives of our conduct, gives a direetl}^ contrary conclusion, 
and as loudly proclaims the necessity of tnan^s actions.'' From this 
extract we may suppose that the question is candidly investigated ; and 
he shows that the existence of our free agency has been unequivocally 
declared by our Saviour himself; that St. Paul, also, is consistent with 
himself, and with the doctrine of his Almighty Master. "Ask your- 
selves," he exclaims, "whether that beautiful and energetic exhorta- 
tion (12th and 13th Romans) to every moral and Christian excellence 
conld possibly be the work of a man believing in the humiliating doc- 
trine of strict moral necessity?" 

t Bramhall's Works, vol. iv. p. 191. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHir. 177 

there is 7ieither fore-knoivledge nor after-knowledge in Him. 
The knowledge of God comprehends all times in a point, by 
reason of the eminence and virtue of its infinite perfection. 
And yet I confess that this is called foreknowledge in respect 
of us. But tliis foreknowledge doth 'produce no absolute 
7iecessity. Things are not therefore because they are fore- 
known, but therefore they are foreknown because they shall 
come to pass. If any thing should come to pass otherwise 
than it doth, yet God's knowledge could not be irritated by 
it : for then He did not know that it should come to pass as 
He now doth, because every knowledge of vision necessarily 
presupposeth its object. God did know that Judas should 
betray Christ : but Judas loas not necessitated to be a traitor 
by God's knowledge. If Judas had not betrayed Christ, 
then God had not foreknown that Judas should betray 
Him." 

All who read Hobbes, Jonathan Edwards, and Calvin, 
should read this work of Bramhall's also. Alexander Knox 
says,* " I think, of few things I can be more sure, than that 
Calvinistic predestination is not in the Bible : 'providentiaX 
predestination runs all through it : and a warm imagination, 
when once the idea was taken up, made it easy to transmute 
the one into the other." The Church of England in her 
17th article, wherein, said Dr. Johnson, she mentions this 
matter " with as little positiveness as could be," does not 
assert the doctrine, of absolute predestination, because, in the 
article just before, she states that " we may fall from grace 
given," which tenet would be inconsistent with the other : 
and indeed we may say that with such a doctrine the exist- 
ence of a Liturgy, or the use of any prayer at all, would be 
inconsistent. And thus Hobbes denies prayer to be either a 
cause or a means of God's blessings, for God's will is un- 
changeable. But, retorts Bramhall, to " change the will," 
and " to will a change," are two different things ; " to change 
the will argues a change in the agent, but to will a change 
only argues a change in the object." We can only say, on 
Bramhall's first great proposition above stated, that every 

* Correspondence with Bishop Jebb, vol. i. p. 123. Letter 20. 
H* 



178 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

change in our wills is known to the always present knowl- 
edge of God, and that such terms as " from the foundation 
of the world," &c., which seem to us to argue foreknowledge 
in God, actually only signify present knowledge with Hira 
in whom is no past or future, but one present time ; and 
when we think we are particularly acute and clever in 
making discoveries in this most abstruse theology, let us bear 
in mind the archbishop's caution, " Too much light is an 
enemy to the light, and too much law is an enemy to justice. 
I could wish we wrangled less about God's decrees until we 
understood them better." Meanwhile, let us agree with our 
British poet : * 

" One adequate support 
For the calamities of mortal life 
Exists — one only ; an assured belief 
Tliat the procession of our fate, howe'er 
Sad or disturb'd, is order'd by a Being 
Of infinite benevolence and power ; 
Whose everlasting purposes embrace 
All accidents, converting them to good :" 

for this is the resolution we must at last arrive at, in com- 
mon with Parnell's "beading hermit," and confess that the 
Almighty, 

"Your actions uses, nor controls your will." 

The celebrated works of Bramhall comprise "An Answer 
to M. de la Militiere ;" " A just Vindication of the Church 
of England from the unjust Aspersion of Criminal Schism ;" 
" A Replication to the Bishop of Chalcedon : with Appendix 
in Answer to the Exceptions of William Sergeant ;" " Schism 
Guarded, &c. ;" "The Consecration and Succession of Prot- 
estant Bishops justified." This was among the most popular 
of his works, and amply refutes the idle story of the Nag's 
Head Consecration. " Discourses against the English Sect- 
aries," "The Serpent Salve," "Vindication of himself and 
the Episcopal Clergy, &c. :" and, we may justly own, after 
reading these works, that whoever wishes to withstand the 
encroachments of Popery or Dissent should by no means 
* Wordsworth's Excursion, book iv. line 11, &c. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 179 

neglect a diligent perusal of Bramhall : for, from his writings, 
he will indeed come forth a scholar, armed at all points for 
attack or defense. In his controversies with the Church of 
Rome, Jeremy Taylor tells us, that "he stated the questions 
so wisely, and conducted them so prudently, and handled 
them so learnedly, that I may truly say, they never were 
more materially confuted by any man since the questions 
have so unhappily disturbed Christendom." 

The latest editor of his works observes, while he excuses 
the occasional homeliness of the language, that, "It is im- 
possible to read a sentence of Bramhall's writings without 
feeling that he is in earnest." We are told that "he was a 
firm friend to the Church of England, bold in the defense of 
it, and patient in sufiering for it : yet he was very far from 
any thing like bigotry. He had a great allowance and 
charity for men of different persuasions, looking upon those 
churches as in a tottering condition that stood upon nice 
opinions.'''' He thought it to be the interest of the Protest- 
ant church to widen her foundation, and make her articles 
as charitable and comprehensive (so saith Paley also) as she 
could, that those nicer accuracies, that divide the greatest 
wits of the world, might not be made the characteristics of 
reformation, and give occasion to one party to excommuni- 
cate and censure another. Thus he saw the Church of 
England constituted ; both Calvinists and Arminians sub- 
scribing the same propositions, and " walking in the house 
of God as friends." O that the men of the present day who 
love Bramhall, were like-minded with him, and we should 
not witness the painful spectacle of distractions and divisions 
within the church, thus giving power to Rome, and room 
for the taunts and rebukes of dissenters I Thus the poet :* 

" High and Low.^ 
Watchwords of party, on all tongues are rife, 
As if a church, though sprung from heaven, must owe 
To opposites and fierce extremes her life. 
No ! to the golden mean, and quiet Jlow 
Of truths that soften hatred, temper strife.''^ 



* Wordsworth's Sonnets. 



180 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

Bramhall, like most Episcopal divines of that period, en- 
dured much trial and trouble, but was at length wonderfully- 
delivered, and during his life effected much good for the 
church. The eloquent Jeremy Taylor preached his funeral 
sermon, in the course of which he enumerates these matters 
in their due order. In telling his hearers that none can 
avoid the sentence of death, he says, " If wit and learning, 
great fame and great experience ; if wise notices of things, 
and an honorable fortune ; if courage and skill, if prelacy and 
an honorable age, if any thing that could give greatness and 
immunity to a wise and prudent man, could have been put 
in a bar against a sad day, and have gone for good plea, this 
sad scene of sorrows had not been the entertainment of this 
assembly." The bishop further observes, " He was a man 
of great business and great resort : Semj)er aliquis in 
Cydonis domo, as the Corinthians said : ' There was always 
somebody in Cydon's house.' He was fiepL^Gyv rbv (3tdv epyo) 
Kal (3/(3Aw, 'he divided his life into labor and his book.' " 
He describes him as possessing Hooker's judiciousness, Jew- 
ell's learning, the acuteness of Bishop Andrewes ; and sums 
up by saying, " He was a wise prelate, a learned doctor, a 
just man, a true friend, a great benefactor to others, a thank- 
ful beneficiary where he was obliged himself" Such a char- 
acter from a man so learned and just as Taylor is indeed of 
value ; and let it be said to every man who would take part, 
or wish for decision and settledness, in the great controversial 
questions of this day, and which are more and more advanc- 
ing with power and passion in proportion as Rome marches 
through the land and gathers strength, or as Dissent increases 
and is the occasion of anarchy and trouble, let it be over and 
over again spoken in the ears of men, " Read Bramhall ; 
whatever else you read or hear, sit down and read the un- 
dying works of Bramhall ; ay, read Hooker, read Andrewes, 
read Beveridge, read Taylor, but nevertheless, take good 
heed that you neglect not a patient and digestive reading 
of Bramhall I Then your information on all points of the 
usual controversies will be full and satisfactory." 

Johnson praised John Bunyan highly. "His 'Pilgrim's 
Progress' has great merit, both for invention, imagination, 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 181 

and the conduct of the story. Few books, I believe, have 
had a more extensive sale." He observes, that it is remark- 
able, that it begins very much like the poem of Dante, and 
yet no translation of Dante, had appeared when Banyan 
wrote. He thought also that he must have read Spenser. 
" The Pilgrim's Progress," recommended in great degree by 
the persecution that poor Bunyan underwent (and hence the 
singular circumstances under which it was published), ere he 
was released by the kind interposition of the Bishop of Lin- 
coln (Dr. Barlow), is still a popular book, and likely to con- 
tinue so. The poorer classes of people, when they once un- 
derstand it, are fond of it, but it is puzzling oftentimes to 
know what to answer, when they ask whether it be all true ? 
If you say, It is not ; then they would probably consider 
their time wasted in reading any more of it : and still, you 
can hardly aver that it is true, although drawing a picture 
of what may be true ; to explain to them its allegorical 
nature would not be satisfactory. Bunyan's other religious 
parables and tracts, in the opinion of many, are deservedly 
consigned to oblivion. 

Isaac Walton, religious, modest, quaint Isaac Walton, well 
might Dr. Johnson send word to Dr. Home, that all the atten- 
tion he could give, " shall be cheerfully bestowed upon what 
I think a pious work, the preservation and elucidation of 
Walton, hij whose xvritings, I have been most pleasingly 
edijiedy And again, Boswell informs us, " He talked of 
' Isaac Walton's Lives,' which was one of his most favorite 
books. Dr. Donne's Life, he said, was the most perfect of 
all." This is a perfect, as well as a popular book — it is the 
simplicity, the meekness, the truthfulness, the cheerfulness, 
and modesty of Walton that charms us in his character of a 
biographer. Of this latter quality he gives us a sample in 
his Preface to Dr. Donne's Life, wherein he says, " If the 
author's glorious spirit, which now is in heaven, can have 
the leisure to look down and see me, the poorest, the meanest 
of all his friends, in the midst of his officious (in the old sense) 
duty, confident I am, that he will not disdain this well-meant 
sacrifice to his memory," &c. Surely in this we perceive a 
sincere humbleness concerning himself, united with a be- 



182 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

coming confidence in the departed one's integrity : for it was 
but the convert rightly remembering the converter, as he said, 

" Forget his powerful preaching : and forget 
I am his convert." 

It is to be regretted that the republication of " Walton's 
Lives" was not undertaken by Bishop Home ; he was a fit 
man for the work. 

Come we next to Baxter, a great man and a good, one of 
the most spiritually-minded of non-conformists, and yet not 
without his failings in other people's eyes, and most certainly, 
we may conclude, in his own. In the loving liberality of 
his heart, he was but half non-conformist, and half monarchist. 
Hence, he says, " The Quakers in their shops, when I go 
along London streets, say, ' Alas I poor man, thou art yet in 
darkness.' They have oft come to the congregation, when I 
had liberty to preach Christ's Gospel, and cried out against 
me as a deceiver of the people. They have followed me 
home, crying out in the streets, ' The day of the Lord is 
coming, and thou shalt perish as a deceiver I' They have 
stood in tho market-place, and under my window, year after 
year, crying to the people, ' Take heed of your priests, they 
deceive your souls I' And if any one wore a lace or neat 
clothing, they cried out to me, ' These are the fruits of your 
ministry !' " 

Thus was a good Christian treated by other professing 
Chi'istians, putting us in mind of what happened to the pious 
and charitable Mede. This able and modest divine had lent 
money to a person at Cambridge, whom at a future time, 
when no longer in need, he reminded of his obligation. The 
answer he received was, " That, upon a strict and exact 
account, he had no right to what he claimed." "No right?" 
demanded Mede. " No, no right," rejoined the other, who 
was a Puritan, "because you are none of God's children: 
for they only have right, who are gracious in God's sight I" 
What would Protestants now say, should this their champion 
be thus taunted in the present time : he who has so learnedly, 
at least, brought the prophecies contained in a portion of 
Scripture (the Apocalypse) to bear against the Church of 
Rome : he, who to that common taunt of the Romanists, 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 183 

" Where was your church before Luther?" readily answered, 
" Where was the flour when the wheat went to the mill ?" 

Baxter was a via media man of his days. He expressed 
an open dislike to the usurpation of Cromwell, and told the 
Protector to his face that the people of England held the 
ancient institutions of the country in love and reverence. 
This we may conceive to be the fact ; for when the Restora- 
tion took place, Charles the Second, on being so warmly 
greeted by all classes of the people, said, " The only wonder 
to himself was, that he had not come back before." In 
religion Baxter endeavored to find a halting-place between 
strict Calvinism and high-church Arminianism, reserving the 
doctrine of election, but discarding that of reprobation. As 
he grew older he became milder in his doctrines, and it is to 
the abatement of his zeal against Arminianism that Bramhall 
pithily observes, " I see Truth is the daughter of Time." In 
his early writings he speaks very differently of the fear of 
death to what he does when old age crept upon him — 
naturam expellas furca tamen tisque recurret. Some polit- 
ical allusions, too, of a most exceptionable character, which 
appeared in three editions of his " Saints' Rest," were subse- 
quently expunged. 

Though a non-conformist, he was accounted, in his own 
way, to be a friend to the Established Church, and he 
strongly took the part of the church in supporting the con- 
stitution, when the bishops refused to sanction the reading of 
the Second Declaration of Indulgence, issued by James the 
Second, on the 27th of April, 1688. Every one must see 
that James's professions of liberalism were the masks under 
which he hoped to bring in the Popish religion, and Baxter 
would most quickly perceive this, since, in preaching before 
Cromwell, he appears to think the toleration of sectaries and 
separatists the grand evil of his government. In short, he 
was always trying to repress the sectaries, and to uphold an 
Episcopacy, as he expressed it, " desirable for reformation, 
and peace of Churches ;" and he did so because " it being 
agreeable to the Scripture and primitive government, is like- 
liest to be the way of a more universal concord, if ever the 
churches on earth arrive to such a blessing ; however, it rvill 



184 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

he most acceptable to God, and well-informed consciences." 
But he met with the usual fate of a reconciler. " And 
thus," says Macaulay, "zealous churchmen called him a 
E-oundhead ; and many non-conformists accused him of 
Erastianism and Arminianism ;" he himself, in his "Grotian 
Religion," branding Grotius as a Papist in disguise. He 
also felt aware of the wrong nature of his earlier impetuosity, 
and hence supposed that the prohibition on David was laid 
upon himself also ; for he says, " I have been, in the heat of 
my zeal, so forward to change, and ivays of blood, that I fear 
God will not let me have a hand in the peaceable building 
of his church, nor to see it ; for I have always been taken 
off when I attempted it." Those who wish to read the trial 
of Baxter, when arraigned before the furious and bloody- 
minded Jeffreys, must turn to the pages of Macaulay's mag- 
nificent History of England. 

Like that of Bunyan, the name of Baxter will ever be a 
cherished one in England. His " Call to the Unconverted," 
and " Saints' Rest," are books universally known, and almost 
as universally admired. The man is to be pitied who loves 
them not. Boswell asked Johnson what works of Richard 
Baxter's he should read ? and the reply was characteristic of 
the religious mind within him, " Read any of them ; they 
are all good." At another time he said, " Baxter's ' Reasons 
of the Christian Religion' contain the best collection of the 
evidences of the divinity of the Christian system." Addison's 
" Evidences of the Christian Religion," however, must never 
be forgotten. 

Baxter lived in troubled and fanatical times, when it might 
be said of the high and turbulent of both sides, that some- 
times they trod on the head of a saint, and sometimes spat in 
the face of an angel ; for virulent factions have little dis- 
crimination, little esteem for the virtues of opponents. When 
Besme, the wretch who assassinated Admiral de Coligny in 
cool blood, was taken by M. de Berthauville, he said, " I 
was always, you know," discharging a pistol at him, " a 
wicked dog I" " But I," said Berthauville, sheathing his 
sword in the murderer's body, " am determined that you shall 
be wicked no longer." Well would it be if we could turn 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 185 

this sword against our own selves, for, in reality, there is a 
species of murder going on between religious sects, when men 
are instigated to say all the malicious words they can imag- 
ine, and would act, as in former days, if the humane common 
law of the land, combined with a more charitable spirit of 
public opinion, did not restrain them. 

Dr. Johnson did not speak well of Burnet ; he was not a 
man after his own heart. He thought the " History of his 
own Times" very entertaining, though the style " mere chit- 
chat." He did not think he intentionally lied, but was so 
much prejudiced, that he took no pains to find out the truth. 
" He was like a man," he said, ''■ who resolves to regulate 
his own time by a certain watch, but will not inquire 
whether the watch is right or not." If we substitute the 
words " church" or " sect" for watch, we shall find very 
many individuals of this description, who follow after a name 
or a party without due and candid investigation. On another 
occasion he said of this book, " The first part of it is one of 
the most entertaining books in the English language : it is 
quite dramatic : while he went about every where, saw every 
where, and heard every where." By the first part he meant, 
so far as it appears that Burnet himself was actually engaged 
in what he has told, which might easily be distinguished. 

Bishop Burnet's great and enduring works may be said to 
be his History of the Reformation, his Exposition of the 
Thirty-nine Articles of the Church of England, and his Pas- 
toral Care, from the pages of which quotations have been 
already given. In his preface to the Exposition he modestly 
says : '• I had no other design in this work, but first to find 
out the truth myself, and then to help others to find it out. 
If I succeed to any degree in this design, I will bless God for 
it ; and if I fail in it, I will bear it with the humility and 
patience that becomes me. But as soon as I see a better 
work of this kind, I shall be among the first of those who 
shall recommend that, and disparage this." And now, one 
hundred and fifty years after this was written, the book is 
more commended than ever. Archbishop Tillotson has been 
blamed, because, as archbishop, he thus expressed himself to 
Burnet in praise of one portion of the Exposition : "In the 



186 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

article of the Trinity," he wrote, " you have said all that I 
think can be said upon so obscure and difficult an argument ;" 
adding, " the Socinians have just now published an answer 
to us all." But the fact is, that Burnet was a man of re- 
markable sense and prudence, so that he wrote in defense of 
the Trinity, just as Bishop Hoadley wrote in defense of Epis- 
copacy : both of these divines amply proved their several 
cases, without entering upon the higher parts of the argu- 
ment : indeed Burnet would never run into extremes, but al- 
ways sought to lay down such proof and persuasion as might 
prevail with wise and good men. He loved a broad founda- 
tion, and hence of the articles he says, where they " are con- 
ceived in large and general words, and have not more special 
and restrained words in them, we ought to take that for a 
sure indication that the church does not intend to tie men 
up too severely to particular opinions, but that she leaves all 
to such a liberty as is agreeable with the purity of the faith." 
Burnet was neither high church and eloquent as Atterbury, 
nor so spiritual as Baxter, but a man of enlarged and liberal 
views, endued with great variety of learning ; indeed very few 
books escaped his research, of all that had been printed from 
the time that printing presses were first set up in England to 
the end of Queen Elizabeth's reign. He thought two of the 
best books which we have, were " Laud's Conference with 
Fisher the Jesuit," and Chiilingworth's " Religion of Protest- 
ants," &c., the former famous for its great learning, judgment, 
and exactness ; the latter written with so clear a thread of 
reason, and in so lively a style, that it was justly reckoned, 
with the above, to be the best book that had been written in 
our language. 

Burnet set out in life with higher church opinions than he 
afterward held ; in short, he is a rare instance of a man be- 
coming more liberal, and, as he was accounted, latitudinarian, 
as he gi'ew older and more acquainted with the world of men. 
For this, like Tillotson, he suffered persecution, but now his 
works are well esteemed by the whole church. He rightly 
acted the important office of a bishop. " I venerate the 
memory of this good prelate," says Lady Huntingdon,* a non- 
* Her Memoirs, vol. i. p. 40. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHUROHMANSHIP. 187 

conformist, " and I love those who have descended from him, 
praying that the hke faith which was in him may be in them 
also :" and from his daughter, an excellent woman, her lady- 
ship learnt, that "the bishop, from the zealous care of his 
diocese, made it a rule yearly to visit the various parishes of 
which it was composed ; and treated with the most distin- 
guished regard such ministers as were eminent for their piety, 
and most attentive in their care of the souls of the people." 
It is a good sentence that he wrote : "A greater disparage- 
ment to the Christian religion can not be imagined, than to 
propose the hopes of God's mercy and pardon barely iipon be- 
lieving, ivithoitt a life suitable to the rules it gives us."* 
Of course, when the Church of England states that we are 
justified by faith only, she means a fruitful faith, a faith 
which worketh by love ; so that we are really justified, not 
by mere belief only, and not by works alone, but by faith and 
works united ; and if we believe not till we come to our 
death-beds, and, like the thief on the cross, can perform no 
good works, if we believe God, it must be left to Him to ac- 
count it as righteousness or not, even as it seemeth fit to His 
good pleasure ; albeit nearly up to the last moments of life 
some evidences of a real faith may be afforded through works, 
the work of patience, it may be, to our souls. Again, in al- 
luding to "forgive us our trespasses," and "give us this day 
our daily bread," being standing petitions, he says, " We sin 
daily, and do always need a pardon. Upon these reasons 
we conclude, that someiohat of the man enters into all that 
tnen do." But this sentence, from the conclusion of the His- 
tory of his own Times, should be engraven on the mind of 
every minister of the Church of England. " Maintaining 
arguments for more power than we have, will have no effect, 
unless the world see that we make a good use of the authority 
already in our hands. It is with the clergy as with princes : 
the only way to keep the prerogative from being uneasy to 
their subjects, and being disputed, is to manage it vjholhj 
for their good and advayitage. Then all will be for it, 
when they find it is for them. Let the clergy live and labor 
well, and they tvill feel as much authority tvill follow as 
* Exposition of Article XII. 



188 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

they will hrwiv lioiv to manage viell. They will never he 
secured or recovered from contonpt, but by living and labor- 
ing as they ought." What sound advice is this to princes 
and pastors I Had it been followed, the history of the kings 
of England would not be such as it is; Charles the First 
had not been executed ; neither would the spirit of revolution 
have been aroused throughout foreign nations in the year 
1848. Our own blessed queen has manifestly been trained 
to observe this principle as propounded by the bishop. But 
to clergymen it is of most essential service : he who cares 
for others will be cared for himself. In rebuke, as well as 
in guidance, the respect and love of the people is of paramount 
importance. Let a touching anecdote illustrate this :* A 
clergyman, of a remarkable spirit of love, sharply rebuked, in 
the presence of a clerical friend, a parishioner for gross mis- 
conduct. The severity of the reproof astonished his friend, 
who could not help declaring, that in his own case, with one 
of his people, he should have expected an irreconcilable 
breach. The answer was the result of Christian wisdom and 
experience : " Oh, my friend, when there is love in the heart, 
you may say any thing I" No man more than Dr. Johnson 
himself, as we have seen, respected a laborious clergyman, 
and reprobated a careless one. The man that attended on 
the death-bed of Rochester ; that wrote a letter of just cen- 
sure to his king, and accompanied Russell to the scaffold ; 
who was a good pastor and good bishop, could he but have 
known him, would, we may conjecture, have obtained Dr. 
Johnson's regard. He could not like his politics, but he 
would have approved of many of his writings. Take this 
true sentence : "It is the glory of the church, that in her 
disputes on both hands, as well with those of the Church of 
Rome as with those that separate from her, she has both the 
doctrine and the constitution of the primitive church on her 
side."t 

Dr. Doddridge Avas mentioned by Johnson as being the 
author of one of the finest epigrams in the English language, 

* It is told in Bridge'.s " Christian Ministry," p. 654. 
t "Pastoral Care," in Clergyman's Instructor, ch. iv. p. 139, 
4th ed. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 189 

It consists of a sacred rendering of his family motto, Dum 
vivinius vivamus. But this was praise given to a very 
small thing, when we consider the greatness and excellency of 
his works, especially his " Family Expositor," and " The Rise 
and Progress of Religion in the Soul." Although he would 
place baptismal regeneration in the shade, for he evidently 
confounds regeneration with conversion, yet one sentence or 
two gives a loophole through which all the maintainers of 
baptismal regeneration may find a way of escape from his 
general view of regeneration. He was not averse to forms 
of prayer, and such forms he wrote. The learned Bishop 
Warburton was one of his correspondents. Croker mentions 
that some of his letters have been recently published, with no 
great advantage to his fame. Strange, that in his funeral 
sermon on the enthusiast. Colonel Gardiner, he should have 
deliberately declared, that "it was hard for him to say where, 
but in the book of God, the Colonel found his example, or 
where he had left Ids eqiial!" Doddridge was always 
warm-hearted, and such thoroughly kind and devoted men 
are apt to go too far. He died a serene death, and felt no 
concern for his departure, beyond the grief it would occasion 
his wife ; but even in allusion to this, he said, " I can cheer- 
fully leave my dear Mrs. Doddridge a widow in a strange 
land (at Lisbon), if such be the appointment of our heavenly 
Father." Thus this true saint would have have pleased an 
apostle, for he was not "without natural affection." 

Of Bishop Warburton's abilities Dr Johnson thought most 
highly. Perhaps his strong sense of gratitvide prejudiced him 
in some degree toward the liking of this learned man. " He 
praised me at a time," he said, " when praise was of value to 
me." This was spoken in relation to encomiastic rem.arks of 
Warburton on some criticisms on Macbeth, put forth by Dr. 
Johnson. Sir John Hawkins tells us, that Johnson being 
asked, " Whether he had ever been in company with Dr. 
Warburton," answered, " I never saw him till one evening, 
about a week ago, at the Bishop of St. Asaph's : at first he 
looked surlily at me ; but after we had jostled into conversa- 
tion he took me to a window, asked me some questions, and 
before we parted was so well pleased with me that he patted 



190 DR. JOHNSOiN'S CHUROHMANSHIP. 

me." " You, always, sir, preserved a great respect for him ? " 
"Yes, and justly : when as yet I was in no favor with the 
world, he spoke well of me, and I hope I never forgot the 
obhgation." The bishop was greatly pleased with Johnson's 
high-spirited letter to Lord Chesterfield, in which he rejected 
that nobleman's condescensions in a manner worthy a noble 
son of literature ; for such language was in accordance with 
the bishop's own meekness of mind ; and then Warburton 
sent a message of congratulation to our leviathan. Dr. John 
son was visibly pleased, because a word of praise from such a 
man was of great account in his estimation. At a time when 
Edwards's Canons on Criticism appeared, aud his eulogizers 
would have exalted him to a par with Wai'burton, " Nay," 
said Johnson, " there is no proportion between the two men; 
they must not be named together. A fly, sir, may sting a 
stately horse" (Edwards had sharply criticised Warburton), 
" and make him wince ; but one is but an insect, and the 
other is a horse still." 

When George the Third observed to Johnson, that he 
supposed he must have read a great deal, he said, in his reply, 
that he had not read much, compared with Dr. Warburton. 
And then the king said, that he had heard Dr. Warburton 
was a man of such general knowledge, that you could scarce 
talk with him on any subject on which he was not qualified 
to speak ; and that his learning resembled Garrick's acting 
in its universality. The conversation thence turning on the 
controversy between Warburton and Lowth, Johnson remark- 
ed, " Warburton has most general, most scholastic learning ; 
Lowth is the more correct scholar." 

Warburton wrote to Bishop Hurd in an unfriendly way of 
Johnson, in regard to certain criticisms ; and Johnson, we 
know, as Dr. Parr says, "was of literary merit a sagacious, 
but a most severe judge ; " yet we have no reason to think 
that these great men did not admire each other's talents : in 
short, Warburton said of Johnson, "I admire him, but lean 
not bear his style ; " and Johnson being told of this, said, 
"That is exactly my case as to him." And yet, Boswell in- 
forms us, the manner in which he expressed his admiration 
of the fertility of Warburton's genius, and of the variety of 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 191 

his materials, was, " The table is always full, sir. He brings 
things from the north and the south, and from every quarter. 
In his 'Divine Legation' you are always entertained. He 
carries you round and round, without carrying you forward to 
the point ; but then, you have no wish to be carried forward." 
And he said to the Rev. Mr. Strahan, " Warburton is, perhaps, 
the last man who has written with a mind full of reading 
and reflection." 

In the Life of Pope, Johnson writes of Warburton's wonder- 
ful abilities, and the haughty confidence which these abilities 
gave him : for, in truth, he was, as Gibbon styled him, "the 
dictator and tyrant of the world of literature." At the time 
that he wrote his famous remarks on behalf of Pope's " Essay 
on Man," refuting the idea that it favored fatalism, Pope 
himself wrote to him, and said in his letter, "You have made 
my system as clear as I ought to have done, and could not. 
It is, indeed, the same system as mine, but illustrated with a 
ray of your own, as they say our natural body is the same 
still when it is glorified." Pope afterward lived in the great- 
est intimacy with him ; and Warburton was made a bishop 
solely from the vastness of his literary and theological talents. 
Bishop Newton, in quoting from Warburton's " Divine Lega- 
tion," * speaks of him as one "who improves every subject 
that he handles." 

Warburton had many opponents, for he attacked many 
men of eminence. Neither could he at all like the ideas and 
feelings of the enthusiastic followers of religion. The biog- 
rapher of Lady Huntingdon speaks roughly of him, as he 
does too of many others undeservedly ; he says,t " with ids 
characteristic rudeness, he pronounced her an incurable en- 
thusiast : for with him all personal experience of a divine 
witness by the Spirit of God in the heart, was rank enthusi- 
asm." And yet, Warburton writes, " In the promulgation 
of a new religion, besides those marks of truth arising from 
the reasonableness and purity of the doctrine, which show it 
worthy of God, to prove it actually came from Him there is 
need of certain miraculous gifts, which the Holy Spirit im- 

* Dissert, on the Prophecies, vol. i. p. 85. 
t Vol. i. p. 443. 



192 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

parts to those •with, whom he then condescends to dwell. 
£ut the peculiar office of the Holy Spirit is the sanctijica- 
tion of the heart.'"* True we may find, in the perversity of 
man, new matter of glory to God. " And we bless the hand," 
he says, " which turned the avarice of a furious friar (Lu- 
ther), and the luxury of a debauched monarch (Henry VIII), 
from their natural mischiefs, to become instruments of the 
choicest blessings — the recovery of letters, and the restoration 
of religion." 

And yet, when we see what enthusiasm has achieved in 
the civil world, we may well be tempted to seek its warm 
help in the promotion of a religion which is militant here on 
earth. An eminent writer of Essays, after expressing his 
wish that enthusiasm may be expelled from its religious do- 
minions, but maintained in its civil possessions, looking upon 
it, in all other points but that of religion, to be a very neces- 
sary turn of mind, says: " To strike this spirit out of the 
human constitution, to reduce things to their precise philo- 
sophical standard, would be to check some of the main wheels 
of society, and to fix half the world in an useless apathy."! 
True, but still really great hearts and minds are not enthusi- 
astic. Nelson had a great heart, not an enthusiastic one : 
Wellington and Napoleon were never enthusiasts, although 
so many around them might be made so by them : Wesley's 
disposition was not enthusiastic : these men were possessed of 
a more enduring principle than enthusiasm could have en- 
gendered. Warburton liked M'armth and pathos, and de- 
cides, in the case of preaching, that " a pathetic address to 
the passions and affectioJis of penitent hearers, is perhaps 
the most operative of all the various species of instruction." 
What can exceed the extreme pathos of our Lord's language ? 
what surpass the afi'ection of His actions ? and yet, there is 
nothing of the enthusiast displayed in the whole course of His 
marvelous career. In the Church of Rome, we may say, 
that feelings of enthusiasm are carried to their highest pitch, 
and extremes nowhere more completely meet than in the ex- 
temporaneous addresses of the mendicant friar, and the illit- 
erate ranter. Warmth of heart, guided by intelligence and 
■* Matt, xxiii. 2, 3. t Melmoth, 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURGHMANSHIP. 193 

right sense, is always to be desired in the religious life ; 
indeed there is little earnestness of thought and purpose 
■without it. 

There will always be diflerent opinions entertained in re- 
gard to the excellences, intellectual or moral, of great men. 
Johnson's praise of Warburton, a portion only of which is 
given, is exceeded by that of Bishop Newton. " He was, 
indeed, a great genius," says the bishop, " of the most extens- 
ive reading, of the most retentive memory, of the most copi- 
ous invention, of the liveliest imagination, of the sharpest 
discernment, of the quickest wit, and of the readiest and hap- 
piest application of his immense knowledge to the present 
subject and occasion." In private life "he was excellent 
and admirable, both as a companion and a friend ;" in the 
latter character, he " laid open his very heart ; and the at- 
tribute which he was pleased to give to Mr. Pope, of being 
the sold of friendship, was more justly applicable to him, 
and more properly his own I His Avorks are described as a 
KTi]fia eg dei, " a possession for ever." Bishop Newton pro- 
ceeds to draw a comparison, or rather a contrast, between 
Warburton and Dr. Jortin, much to the advantage of the 
former, but saying of each of these extraordinary men, " Their 
superior excellences will live in the mouths and memories 
of men." 

So conspicuously eminent was Warburton's talent, that on 
his publishing a dissertation on the origin of Books of Chivalry, 
&c. which Pope tells him he had not got over two paragraphs 
of, before he cried out, Aut JErasnms, aut Diabolus; " I knew 
you,"* he adds, " as certainly as the ancients did the gods, 
by the first pace, and the very gait. I have not a moment 
to express myself in, but could not omit this which delighted 
me so much." 

After reading these (and still greater encomiums which 
might be adduced from the learned Bishop Hurd's Life of 
Warburton), we turn to the remarks of the Rev. William 
Jones of Nayland, and obtain another view of this renowned 
theologian. This acute and sterling writer describes Warbur- 
ton's books as such that " have a great flash of learning, but 
* Letter 113 to Mr. Warburton, in Pope's Works 
I 



194 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

with little solidity and less piety. To the purity of Christian 
literature they have certainly done, and are still doing, much 
hurt." Harder things are said of Warburton, which need 
not be related, except that Bishop Newton and Mr. Jones 
differ in their prophetical discernment, for the latter thinks 
the Christian world will not derive any great harm, "because 
it is apprehended, the reading of Bishop Warburton's books 
will hereafter be much less than it hath been." It is some- 
what remarkable that this animadversion proceeds from a 
high church source, while the praises of Bishop Newton may 
be said to emanate from an opposite quarter. It must be 
borne in mind, that Mr. Jones could not relish the criticisms 
of Bishop Warburton, on the theological principles of Johii 
Hutchinson, Esq., the famous Mosaic philosopher, the friends 
of whom dreaded the ill effects of the doctor's criticisms 
" from the boldness of the man, and the popularity of his 
books."* 

Dr. Johnson liked Bishop Hurd, a friend of Warburton's, 
hut of rather a Whiggish cast in pohtics. This appears in 
his celebrated " Moral and Political Dialogues," although 
much modified in a subsequent edition. When his lordship 
declined the honor of becoming Archbishop of Canterbury, 
Johnson said, " I am glad he did not go to Lambeth : for 
after all, I fear he is a Whig in his heart." We need not 
in this place descant on Johnson opinion of Whigs and Tories. 
However, after having at one time stated that Hurd was one 
of those men who account for every thing systematically {too 
systematically, he meant), he said, at another, " Hurd, sir, is 
a man whose acquaintance is a valuable acquisition." 

Both in Hannah More's and Lady Huntingdon's Memoirs, 
Bishop Hurd is mentioned with approbation.! In speaking 
of the strong sentiments of piety that imbued the mind of 
George the Third, yet reprobating the conduct of those about 
him, who, in their zeal to amuse him sought to weaken his 

• See life of Bishop Home, by Rev. W. Jones, M.A. of Nayland ; 
in the sixth volume of Jones of Nayland's Works, p. 47, 48. Mr. Hutch- 
inson was an opponent of Dr. Woodward on natural history, and Sir 
Isaac Newrton in philosophy. 

t Memoirs of Hannah More, vol. iii. p. 240. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHIVIANSHIP. 195 

religious habits, and draw him off from his wonted strict ob- 
servance of the Lord's day, Hannah More says, " I wish any 
one had the honest courage to tell him a little circumstance 
respecting a prelate, whom he has always loved and honored 
above the whole bench, the Bishop of Worcester. The king 
had last summer intended a visit to his venerable aged friend, 
and a letter was sent to fix the day of his coming to him. 
The bishop happened to receive this letter on a Sunday, and 
no entreaties of his family could prevail on him to open it 
until the next day, lest the knowledge that the king was on 
the point of coming should agitate his spirits, and indispose 
him for the duties of the day." 

In the Memoirs of the Countess of Huntingdon,*^ we are 
told that the venerable Dr. Hurd, Bishop of Worcester, being 
in the habit of preaching frequently, had observed a poor 
man remarkably attentive, and made him some little present. 
After a while, he missed his humble auditor, and meeting 
him, said, " John, how is it that I do not see you in the aisle 
as usual ?" John, with some hesitation, replied, " My Lord, 
I hope you will not be offended, and I will tell you the truth. 
I went the other day to hear the Methodists, and I under- 
stand their plain words so much better, that I have attended 
them ever since." The bishop put his hand into his pocket, 
and gave him a guinea, with words to this effect : " God 
bless you, and go where you can receive the greatest profit 
to your soul." This will commonly be accounted noble of 
the bishop, and yet, we may suppose that he gave not the 
poor man a guinea because he went to hear the Methodists, 
but because he saw in him (apart from their scheme of divi- 
sion), a true simplicity of faith, and sincerity of character. 
And it showed also that the bishop knew what was in man — 
in poor uninstructed man ; for very many of the humbler classes 
know nothing of the reasons and arguments in favor of the supe- 
rior claims of the church, and go to hear other preachers with- 
out the slightest hostility to the church, simply because they 
think it all very good tliat they hear, so that it be something 
of the Gospel. Indeed, in many cases, they themselves have 
been the very first to acquaint their clergyman of the fact of 
Vol. i. p. 18. 



196 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

such attendance, thinking the announcement sure of gaining 
his cordial approbation ; neither in many instances, wherein 
the willfully schismatic or presumptive spirit has been want- 
ing, but all is humbleness and candor, have they been dis- 
appointed. 

Dr. Johnson, who loved the virtue of gentleness in others, 
and thought it the first of recommendations of a man's char- 
acter, would have liked to have listened to Bishop Kurd's 
description of true, in contradistinction to artificial politeness, 
as being " modest, unpretending, generous. It appears, as 
little as onay be, and when it does a courtesy, would will- 
ingly conceal it. It chooses silently to forego its own claims, 
not officiously to withdraw them. It engages a man to 
prefer his neighbor to himself; because he really esteems 
him ; because he is tender of his reputation ; because he 
thinks it more manly, more Christian, to descend a little 
himself, than to degrade another." 

Bishops Watson and Home he admired. The " Chemical 
Essays" of the former met with his approval more than the 
political and ecclesiastical opinions advanced by his lordship. 
Never did there breathe a more zealous supporter of civil 
and religious liberty ; and how many of his ecclesiastical 
reforms have passed, and are passing, into law I Still have 
the difficulties intermingled with private patronage, and the 
boundaries of parishes, to be overcome ; and hence a wish of 
the bishop (the better ministration of the offices of the church 
in districts which should be less extensive) to be fulfilled, 
which, as much as any other, is engaging the attention of 
church reformers in this day. '■ Without wishing," he said, 
" to see all preferments of the same value, I shall never 
cease to wish, that no living in the kingdom may be so small, 
as to render it necessary for any man to have two." It has 
been insinuated, that because this bishop held the poorest 
see, therefore he was so ardent in bringing about an equality, 
or nearly so, of the episcopal revenues. But no, this was a 
weak invention of the enemy : yea, " an enemy hath done 
this," he might have exclaimed in Scriptural language ; for 
it was the evils attendant on the translation of bishops that 
he endeavored to destroy, and both in church and in the 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHUKCHMANSHIP. 197 

state, his constant advice was to remove such rotten parts 
of the glorious fabric of civil and religious freedom, as daily- 
invite the attacks of its enemies ; and by timely reformation 
to preserve the mighty edifice, the work of ages, and the 
envy of the world, from being irretrievably injured by the 
rude hand of popular discontent, of fanatical zeal, or republi- 
can violence I 

Of that accomplished and elegant divine, Bishop Home, 
so truthful withal, and sincere, it is almost unnecessary to 
speak, so many must be acquainted intimately with his dis- 
courses, and all with his memoirs, as written admirably by 
his friend and companion, Jones of Nayland. In regard- 
ing the primitive orthodoxy, piety, poverty, and depressed 
state of the Episcopalian Church in Scotland, he thought, 
that, " if the great apostle of the Gentiles were upon earth, 
and it were piit to his choice with what denomination of 
Christians he would communicate, the preference would prob- 
ably be given to the Episcopalians of Scotland, as most like 
to the people he had been used toT * 

There is a curious anecdote of very modern date, told in 
reference to the poverty of the Episcopal Church in Scotland. 
On one occasion, when a nobleman's family were leaving 
that country for England, and arrangements were being 
made for the servants of his lordship's establishment to follow 
in a few days, they begged permission to stay one day longer, 
because it was fixed for a Confirmation. The day arrived ; 
the servants were arrayed in their best attire, hoping to 
witness all the company, and the presence of the bishop, as 
seen at an English Confirmation ; time passed on, a few young 
people, decent but shoeless enough, began to assemble : now 
and then a peasant and farmer arrived, but not yet the 
bishop. Of every fresh comer a servant asked, " Where is 
the bishop ?" To a little individual in a rusty coat, and 
mounted on a rough shelty, the question was eagerly put, 
" When will the bishop arrive ?" " In truth," answers th^ 
rider, but in broad Scotch dialect, "I am all the bishop you'll 
see to-day." And his lordship smilingly trotted on, to the 
utter amazement of the pampered menials of the nobleman. 
* Jones of Nay land's Works, vol. vi. p. 141. 



198 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

Bishop Home died as he had Hved. Hannah More writes 
of her sister's last call, when he was actually dying, and had 
just received the sacrament with his family, with extraordi- 
nary devotion ; and says, " Every text he repeated, every 
word he uttered, consisted of praise, and the most devout 
thankfulness. He took leave of all separately, exhorted and 
blessed them." His man told her, that about two o'clock 
he calmly pronounced the words, " Blessed Jesus I" stretched 
himself out, and expired with the utmost tranquillity. Such 
was the end of " the wise, the witty, the pleasant, the good 
Bishop of Norwich :" equaled certainly in the happiness and 
serenity of his final departure by the eminent Bishop of Lon- 
don, Dr. Porteus. 

Jones of Nayland * relates a circumstance which can not 
fail to put us in mind of the extraordinary dream of Lord 
Lyttelton, to whom the exact minute of his death was fore- 
told. On the Friday before the bishop's death, while his 
housekeeper was in waiting by his bedside, he asked her on 
what day of the week the seventeenth day of the month 
would fall ? She answered, on Tuesday. " Make a note 
of that," said he, " in a book," which, to satisfy him, she 
pretended to do. This proved to be the day on which he 
died, as quietly as he had lived. From this occurrence a 
rumor got abroad, as if he had received some forewarning of 
the time of his death. Jones of Nayland, a learned and 
sagacious man, observes, " To this I can say nothing ; but I 
can think without any danger of being mistaken, that if 
ever there was a man in these latter days, who was worthy 
to receive from above any unusual testimony due to superior 
piety, he was that man" Bishop Home died about twelve 
years after the decease of Dr. Johnson, or this incident would 
probably have arrested his attention, and called forth a 
remai-k stamped with the peculiar reflections of his own 
mind on supernatural intimations. 

We may be right sure that Dr. Johnson never could bear 
the writings of Dr. Priestley, except such as had relation to 
science only. It appears that chemistry was always an in- 
teresting study with Dr. Johnson. While he was in Wilt- 
* In his Works, vol. vi. p. 159. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 199 

shire he attended some experiments made by a physician, 
and frequent mention being made of Dr. Priestley, he knit 
his brows, and in a stern manner inquired, " Why do we 
hear so much of Dr. Priestley ?" He was very properly 
answered, " Sir, because we are indebted to him for these 
important discoveries." On this Dr. Johnson appeared well 
content, and replied, "Well, well, I believe we are ; and let 
every man have the honor he has merited." So strong were 
his feelings against any one whom he thought to be advoca- 
ting pernicious principles, that he could hardly endure his 
society, and on some occasions would leave the room ; yet he 
did meet Dr. Priestley at dinner without rudeness. Johnson 
and Wilkes also met together with much cordiality, although 
the former must have abhorred the politics of the latter. 
Priestley's rule, as a necessitarian, was to hate no man ; for 
he believed that every man was by necessity just what he 
was, and could behave toward himself, or any other man, in 
no other way than he did ; regarding therefore the hatred 
of man toward man as a matter ordered by the Almighty, 
and such as, seeing it could not be avoided, neither should it 
be condemned. From such a doctrine Warburton rescued 
Pope, although the latter was not really a necessitarian ; 
but Priestley, both as a Calvinist and a decided Socinian, 
always adhered to this idea of philosophical necessity. The 
burning of his house and library at Birmingham is well 
known, a cowardly act, and one akin to what might have 
been St. Paul's fate, when, in order to destroy the doctrines, 
they would destroy the man. Dr. Priestley may have 
thought that necessity impelled, and hence gave a right 
to a mob of men to act thus; but it is a certain truth, 
and one always acted upon by the law of man, which 
proceeds from the law of God, that no man has a right to 

DO WRONG. 

Of Dr. Priestley's theological works, Dr. Johnson remark- 
ed, " that they tended to unsettle every thing and yet settled 
nothing." In truth, they only settled this thing, namely, 
that if Sociuianism were universally embraced, a millennium 
of happiness would follow ; no more superstitious respect for 
kings and priests ; no more dispute in polemics ; no more 



200 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

war on nny scale at all : such, at least, is his view in his 
celebrated letter to Edmund Burke. Jones of Nayland has 
given to the vi^orld " A small Whole-length of Dr. Priest- 
ley," in which he criticises vi^ith calmness and reason his 
style, his politics, his feelings, logic, religion, and philosophy : 
and from passages in this estimable clergyman's Life of 
Bishop Home, we find that both himself and the bishop 
thought poorly of the talents of the dissenting doctor, and 
certainly disliked all his principles. He was possessed of 
great cleverness and sagacity in philosophical experiments, 
but was not a man of profound learning ; yet " his vanity 
made him believe that he was wise enough to enlighten, and 
powerful enough to disturb the world."* Dr. Johnson is said 
to have spoken his opinion of the doctor, to Mr. Badcock in 
these words : " You have proved him as deficient in probity as 
he is in learning ;" and he seems further to have signified, t 
that Priestley had borrowed from those who had been bor- 
rowers themselves, and did not know that the mistakes he 
adopted had been rectified by others. He seems to have 
been endued with much urbanity and gentleness of disposi- 
tion, and to have been one, who, in the midst of stirring 
controversies, felt little or no hostility to opponents, but 
rather converted them, while they retained their antipathies 
to his opinions, into personal friends. This is one of 
the best traits in any man's character, and will have its 
meed. 

The Ilev. Dr. Parnell, like other of our poets, Collins and 
Gray, has written little, but that little has been long and 
admiringly preserved. Johnson's memoir of him is short, 
because Goldsmith had undertaken the task before, so he 
contents himself with paying great compliments to the bio- 
grapher : "His criticism," though he does partially difier 
from it in this case, he says, "it is seldom safe to contra- 
dict." His poem, " The Hermit," finds a place in nearly 
all collections of poetry, while his smaller pieces, some 
of which are elegantly composed, are less known. This 



* Jones's Life of Home, p. 133. 

t Gentleman's Magazine, July, 1785. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 201 

stanza gives a true idea of youthful freedom from care and 
sorrow : 

" Ask gliding waters, if a tear 

Of mine increased their stream ? 
Or ask the flying gales, if e'er 
I lent one sigh to them ?" 

And do we not conceive the fairies at work with their wonted 
mystery : 

" Withouten hands the dishes fly, 
The glasses with a wish come nigh, 
And with a wish retii-e." 

He is said to have been a bad prose writer, and yet his 
Visions found a place in the Spectator and Guardian, in the 
pages of which periodicals many must have read them, 
especially No. 460* in the former, without knowing who 
might be the author. He seems to have been a man whose 
exertions were inflamed by hopes of preferment, and with 
changes in high places he changed, quitting the party of 
Addison, Congreve, and Steele, for that of Swift, Pope, Gay, 
and Arbuthnot. Pope, in his dedication of Parnell's poems 
to the Earl of Oxford, pictures the deceased poet as one, in 
contrariety to his sublunary existence, 

" Who careless, now, of interest, fame, or fate, 
Perhaps forgets that Oxford e'er was great : 
Or deeming meanest what we greatest call, 
Beholds thee glorious only in thy fall." 

It is a pity that, after having expressed this fine sentiment on 
the nothingness of our earthly cares and views. Pope should 
proceed in a strain of fulsome eulogy of the earl, although it 
was during his lordship's descent from the height of political 
power, t 

* Vanity, the Paradise of Fools ; a Vision of her and her Attendants. 

t Pope also idolized Bolingbroke. He used to speak of him as a 
being of superior order, that had condescended to visit this lower world : 
in particular, when the last comet appeared and approached near the 
earth, he told some of his acquaintance, " it was sent only to convey 
Lord Bolingbroke home again : just as a stage coach stops at your 
door to take up a passenger." — Warbiirton''s Essay on Pope. 

The poet was something of a man-worshiper, for he quite idolized 
Warburton, showing him exceeding deference. 

I* 



202 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

How affectingly must the later thoughts of our poet Camp- 
bell occur to us ill this place, and his deadness to the vanity 
of posthumous fame, although the desire of such fame may 
be entirely virtuous. " When I think," he said to some 
friends, " of the existence which shall commence when the 
stone is laid above my head, how can literary fame appear to 

me to any one — but as fwthing ?" And he added, with 

the consciousness of a Johnson or an Addison, "It is an in- 
expressible comfort at my time of life, to be able to look back 
and feel that i have fiot written one line against religion or 
virtue .'"* 

Poor Parnell became intemperate in his latter years, and 
Johnson, with his usual charity in stating excuse, where 
excuse could be offered, says, "I have heard it imputed 
to a cause more likely to obtain forgiveness from man- 
kind — the untimely death of a darling son : or, as others 
tell, the loss of his wife, who died in the midst of his 
expectations," 

Of Dr. Young, the author of the ever popular " Night 
Thoughts," Dr. Johnson entertained a high opinion. And 
of this poem, written and obtaining a high place in an Au- 
gustan age of British writers, a poem which Boswell esteemed 
as a mass of the grandest and richest poetry that human 
genius has ever produced, and the very best book for season- 
ing the mind of young persons with thoughts of vital religion, 
Johnson remarks, " The power is in the whole : and in the 
whole there is a magnificence like that ascribed to Chinese 
plantation, the magnificence of vast extent and endless divers- 
ity." He thought also " The Universal Passion" to be truly 
a great performance. Addison, too, has written f highly of 
his poem on the Last Day, as a poem manifesting so many 
noble flights, and those apparently proceeding from a well- 
disposed heart, that the author can not be too much esteemed 
or encouraged. 

Whether he was of a cheerful or pensive turn of mind 
seems to have become a matter of controversy. Perhaps he 

* Life and Letters of Thomas Campbell, edited by William Beattie, 
M.D. 

t The Englishman, No. 11, p. 53. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 203 

was both : probably one or the other in greater proportion at 
different periods of his life, and like Parnell, he never was 
cheerful after his wife's death. Dr. Johnson blamed him for 
this, and yet his own grief on the loss of the wedded partner 
of his life had continued for a long while, and perhaps it was 
never entirely erased from his mind. 

On one occasion, when traveling. Bos well obtained an in- 
vitation from the son of Young,*= who still resided at Welwyn, 
for Dr. Johnson to drink tea and pass the evening. He ad- 
dressed his host, with a polite bow, thus, " Sir, I had a curi- 
osity to come and see this place. I had the honor to know that 
great man your father." They walked in the garden, observ- 
ing a row of trees planted by Dr. Young, and sat in the sum- 
mer-house, on the outside walls of which were the inscriptions, 
" Ambulantes in horto audiebant vocem Dei," and, in reference 
to a brook by which it is situated, the lines of Horace, 

"Vivendi reete qui prorogat horam, 
Rusticus expectat dum defluat amnis : at ille 
Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis sevum." 

Once when walking in this garden with Mr. Langton, Young 
remarked cheerfully enough of a pensive act, " Here I had 
put a handsome sun-dial, with this incription, ' Eheu fugaces I' 

* Dr. Young suffered severely in his last illness. It is pleasing to 
know that he forgave his son. His spirits were so low, and his nerves 
so weak, that he was compelled to decline an interview with him : but 
he said, ^'' I heartily forgive him ;''' and upon mention of this, he gently 
lifted up his hand, and, as gently letting it fall, pronounced these words, 
" God bless him." This information was derived from his curate (Mr. 
Jones) at Welwyn. 

When the Rev. Dr. Webster (grandson to Bishop Sparrow) forward- 
ed to Young his book " On Prayer and on the Sacrament," which was 
dedicated to the admirable Archbishop Herring, its author received this 
note, not unworthy of preservation. It is from the Life of Boioyer, p. 
541: 

" Dear Sir — I have read over your Discourses with appetite, and I 
find in them much piety, perspicuity, eloquence, and usefulness. God 
grant them all the success they deserve, you wish, and the world wants. 
Most assuredly, devotion is the balm of life ; and no man tan go un- 
wounded to the grave. 1 am, yours affectionately, 

" Edward Younq." 



L'O'l DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

which (speaking with a smile) was sadly verified, for by the 
next morning my dial had been carried off." 

In the Lives of the Poets Dr. Johnson has given a Memoir 
of Young by the Rev. Herbert Croft (at that time a barris- 
ter at law), a friend of the poet's son. From this we find 
that he was not rewarded with such preferment as might be 
considered to be due to his excellent labors until very late in 
life, but then he was a politician, " the lion of his master 
Milton ;"* he was a poet, and lived retired from the world; 
and rarely do great men, such as the world designates pa 
Irons, go about carefully in search of merit, but rather chooso 
to promote whatever is usefully and more ostentatiously pre- 
sented before them in their public path : and besides, retired 
men know not what influences are at work for or against 
their promotion ; as has been observed in this especial in- 
stance, " the parties themselves know not often, at the in- 
stant, why they are neglected, or why they are preferred." 
He was certainly a man of great merit, and unblamable 
moral conduct : his worthiness is acknowledged in a letter 
from Archbishop Seeker. In his extreme old age, the ad- 
mired poet could only recollect the names of two friends, his 
housekeeper and his hatter, to mention in his will ; " but at 
eighty-four," observes his biographer, "where," as he adds 
in the Centaur, " is that world into which we were born ?" 
If we mean to have friends, we rnvist continually renew them ; 
for the old ones will die ofi' or become cool : and yet both 
the cherished remembrance of some old friends, and the falling 
away of others, prevent our hearts, in much degree, from be- 
coming again attached to new ones. How true are the re- 
marks of Cicero,t on the bereavement and consequent loneli- 
ness, that may attend on old age, when we have neglected to 
repair the loss of old friends, by new acquisitions ! but still, to 
the Christian mind there must ever be delight in looking for- 
ward to the approaching time when we shall happily be 
reunited to our old friends, and feel our souls to be entirely 
pervaded with one calm, undying sensation of love to 
God, and friendship to all the souls of just men made 

* See his Life in " Lives of the Poets."' 
t Essay on Friendship, p. 306. 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 20o 

perfect in heaven. On this thought a man may well live 
alone during the few last years of his life, and yet rejoice in 
his loneliness. 

Dr. Johnson showed much friendship to the blind poet and 
divine, Rev. Thomas Blacklock, D.D., a man of extraordi- 
nary poetical talent, and of the purest and kindest character. 
He had been blind from the age of six years. When John- 
son met with him in Scotland, he exclaimed in a tender 
manner, " Dear Di". Blacklock, I am glad to see you." Alas I 
Dr. Blacklock could not in return look upon his good friend, 
but he could heai- him : and by the faculty of hearing he 
had gained all his wonderful acquirements. A conversation 
ensued between them, which Boswell in part misinterpreted, 
but which the doctor in a letter afterward explained. As 
to that portion of their argument. Whether it were easier to 
write poetry or lexicography, the determination must be guid- 
ed by the propensity of minds : and we may be rather sur- 
prised to find Dr. Johnson deciding in favor of the facility of 
writing poetry, when we may conceive that he possessed a 
mind peculiarly adapted to what may be called heavy work, 
and that in fact he did dictate his Dictionary with great ra- 
pidity. Certainly the preparation for such a work must have 
been arduous, but many excellent poets are more indebted to 
art than nature, and labor out a poem of apparent easy 
smoothness with great patience and difficulty. 

The father of this poet was in the habit of reading con- 
tinually to his blind son, and the latter was especially pleased 
with the works of Spenser, Milton, Prior, Pope, and Addison. 
Other persons showed great kindness in devoting their time 
to giving him information and instruction. An account of 
his life, character, and poems, was written by the Rev. Mr. 
Spence, a Prebendary of Durham, and for ten years Professor 
of Poetry in the University of Oxford ; and it is a pleasing 
circumstance to find this church dignitary, of whose talent 
for criticism * Dr. Johnson held a high opinion, afiectionately 

* Spence's Anecdotes were read in manuscript by Dr. Johnson ; 
and he derived "great assistance" from them in wi-iting "The Lives 
of the Poets." Tlie work was then in possession of the Duke of New- 
castle, and not fnlly printed until 1820. 



206 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

writing a memoir of the Presbyterian doctor of divinity 
Mr. Spence describes him as " one of the most exraordinary 
characters that has appeared in this or any other age," and 
lauds " his private character, which, were it more generally 
known, would recommend him more to the public esteem than 
the united talents of an accomplished writer." The fact of 
his attaining great excellence in poeti*y, although the chief 
inlets to poetical ideas were closed up to him, and all the 
visible beauties of creation long passed away from before his 
physical eye, could not bvit primarily attract the attention of 
his biographer, and of Dr. Johnson also. Mr. Spence thinks 
that all natural scenery must have been long blotted from his 
memory, and regards him as a prodigy : while Dr. Johnson 
supposes that all passages in his poetry which are descriptive 
of visible objects, " are combinations of what he has remem- 
bered of the works of other writers who could see." And 
Croker observes, that Johnson, no doubt, gives the true solu- 
tion of Blacklock's power, which was memory, and not mir- 
acle ; memory not of what he saw during the six years of his 
sight, but memory of what was read to him ; and thus the 
difficulty of writing such poetry as he did write must have 
been much increased, and his success been more wonderful 
than his composition of sermons, and some other kinds of 
prose works. 

He possessed the virtue of contentedness in a remarkable 
degree ; but we may well conjecture that the loss of his eye- 
sight was a sorrow that must have pressed heavily upon his 
mind. In one of his pieces of poetry, he says : 

" From these intrusive thoughts all pleasure flies, 
And leaves my soul benighted, like my eyes." 

And in another, entitled a Soliloquy, he makes this lament : 

" To me these fair vicissitudes are lost, 
And grace and beauty blotted from my view; 
The verdant vale, the mountains, woods, and streams 
One horrid blank appear. The younof-eyed Spring ; 
EfTulgent Summer ; Autumn deck'd in wealth, 
To bless the toiling head ; and Winter grand. 
With rapid storms, revolve in vain for me ; 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 207 

Nor the bright sun, nor all-embracing arch 
Of heaven, shall e'er these wretched orbs behold. 
Wide o'er my prospect rueful darkness breathes 
Her inauspicious vapor : in whose shade 
Fear, Grief, and Anguish, natives of her reign, 
In social sadness gloomy vigils keep : 
With them I walk, with them still doom'd to share 
Eternal blackness, without hope of dawn." 

It is gratifying to find that in the course of this very poem 
a gleam of hght seems to break in upon his mind, especially 
in relation to his dread of arriving at a state of temporal des- 
titution ; and he expresses his confidence that the care of 
Providence which has hitherto supported him, will support 
and comfort him unto the end. Not only does he become 
satisfied with his condition, but recognizes some very great 
blessings in it : and thus he feels that chastenings and cor- 
rections are rather proofs of the love of God toward him. 
He was truly thankful to the Lord a??d Samuel ; for, in a 
dedication of one of his books * to the Rev. Mr. Spence, he 
says : " It is to your kind patronage that I owe my intro- 
duction to the republic of letters, and to your benevolence, 
in some measure, my persent comfortable circumstances :" 
although he considered Dr. Stevenson of Edinburgh, a 
man of taste, as one of the first patrons of his education. 
There is also a memoir of him published in Anderson's Brit- 
ish Poets. 

It may be observed that usually blind men are cheerful, 
especially so as compared with the deaf, contrary to what 
might have been anticipated. The deaf seem commonly 
to be the victims of suspicion and miserable feeling, with 
distrust of their fellow-creatures. Lucas, in his Introduction 
to the " Inquiry after Happiness," speaks otherwise of his 
blindness : and how beatific are the allusions of Milton to 
this calamity I 

" It is not miserable to be blind," said Milton, in reply to 
one of his cruel antagonists ; "he only is miserable who can 
not acquiesce in his blindness with fortitude." His cheerful 
allusions to his calamity in the opening of the third book of 

* The second part of his " Paraclesis." 



208 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

" Paradise Lost" must be well known : though his eyes saw 
not, it was in his mind that he prayed for light : 

" There plant eyes, all mist from thence 
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell 
Of things invisible to mortal sight." 

But most sublime and affecting are those lines of our great 
epic poet which have been but lately discovered,* com- 
mencing, 

" I am old and blind ! 
Men point at me as smitten by God's power : 
Afflicted and deserted of my kind ; 
Yet am I not cast down." 

No, he acknowledges the gracious goodness of God : 

" On my bended knee 
r recognize Thy purpose clearly shown : 
My vision Thou hast dimm'd that I may see 
Thyself — Thyself alone." 

And the interior powers of his mind are increased : 

" Visions come and go ; 
Shapes of resplendent beauty round me throng ; 
""i-om angel lips I seem to hear the flow 
Of soft and holy song." 

But another glorious example of cheerful submission under 
the calamity of total blindness was set by Lucas, an estima- 
ble divine, whose writings have been cited in these pages. 
He says : " Should I struggle to rescue myself from that 
contempt to which this condition (wherein I may seem lost 
to the world and myself) exposes me ; should I ambitiously 
affect to have my name march in the train of those all 
(though not all equally) great ones, Homer, Appius, Cn. 
Aufidius, Didymus, Walkup, Pere Jean I'Aveugle, &c., all 
of them eminent for their service and usefulness, as well as 
for their afflictions of the same kind with mine ; even this 
might seem almost a commendable infirmity ; for the last 

* Published in the recent Oxford edition of " Milton's Works." 



DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 209 

thing a miiid truly great and philosophical puts off", is the 
desire of glory. Hence Tacitus closes his divine character 
of Helvidius Prisons thus, ' Erant quibus appetentior famfe 
videretur, quando etiam sapientibus cupido glorise novissima 
exuitur.' 

" I was almost induced to believe that this chastisement, 
which had removed me from the service of the altar, did at 
the same time discharge me from all duty owing to the public. 
But my good friend Mr. Lamb revived the dying sparks of 
a decaying zeal, and restored me to a proper sense of my 
duty in this point : for whether by design, or by Providence 
governing chance, I know not (for he never seemed to address 
or design the discoui'se particularly to me), he had ever and 
anon in his mouth this excellent principle, That the life of 
man is to be esteemed by its usefulness and serviceable- 
ness in the world. A sober reflection upon this wrought me 
up to a resolution strong enough to contemn all the difficul- 
ties which the loss of my sight could represent to me in an 
enterprise of this nature. Thus you see on what principles 
I became engaged in this work : * I thought it my duty to 
set myself some task, which might serve at once to divert 
my thoughts from a melancholy application to my misfortune, 
and entertain my mind with such a rational employment as 
might render me most easy to myself, and most servicable to 
all the world. Being now abundantly convinced that I am 
not released from the duty I owe to that body of which I 
am still a member, by being cut off" from a great part of the 
pleasures and advantages of it : therefore like one that truly 
loves his country, when no way else is left him, he fights 
for it on his stumps ; so will I, even in the remains of a 
broken body, express at least my afiection for mankind, and 
breathe out my last gasp in their service." 

The Walkup mentioned in the above extract was an Irish 
prelate before the E-eformation, of whom Wilson has given 
some account. I believe he was blind from his birth ; if so, 
it is curious how he could be received into Holy Orders. 
Mr. Lamb was a dissenter, who at length came over heart 

* This is an extract from the address "To the Reader;" prefixed 
to Lucas's "Inquiry after Happiness." 4th edition, in 1704. 



210 DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 

and soul, upon conviction, to the cliurch. Lucas preached 
his funeral sermon. I suspect he is the same who is men- 
tioned by Baxter in his Life, and whom Baxter tried in vain 
to settle in non-conformity. Lucas's resolution may be very 
cheering to many who are suffering from other afflictions 
than loss of sight : and it is astonishing what some good 
individuals, who are hardly ever free from bodily pain, do 
accomplish in the sacred cause of humanity and religion : 
they do "breathe out their last gasp in the service of man- 
kind" with true and undaunted heroism. 

Of Sterne he had a very poor opinion. A lady once ven- 
tured to ask him how he liked Yorick's sermons. " I know 
nothing about them, madam," was his reply. But some 
time afterward, forgetting himself, he severely censured 
them, and the lady very aptly retorted, "I understood you 
to say, sir, that you had never read them." "No, madam, 
I did read them, but it was in a stage coach. I should 
never have deigned even to look at them had I been at 
larger 

Mr. Wickins records an opinion of the same tendency. 
" I showed him," he says, " Sterne's Sermons." " Sir," said 
he, "do you ever read any others?" "Yes, doctor, I read 
Sherlock, Tillotson, Beveridge, aiad others." "Ay, sir, there 
you drink the cup of salvation to the bottom ; here you have 
merely the froth from the surface." 

Sterne's other writings he equally disliked. " Nothing 
odd, he said, " will do long. ' Tristram Shandy' did not 
last." Another anecdote is most characteristic of Johnson's 
manner ; his rudeness, and subsequent apology. Miss Monck- 
ton (afterward Countess of Cork) insisted that some of Sterne's 
wi'itings were very pathetic. Johnson bluntly denied it. " 1 
am sure," said she, " they have affected me. " Why," said, 
Johnson, smiling and rolling himself about, " that is because, 
dearest, you're a dunce." When she some time afterward 
mentioned this to him, he said, with equal truth and polite- 
ness, " Madam, if I had thought so, I certainly should not 
have said it." 

Yet other eminent men thought well of Sterne. Of the 
celebrated father of Lord Chancellor Bathurst, we have this 



i ■ DR. JOHNSON'S CHURCHMANSHIP. 211 

anecdote* from Sterne's own hand. "He came up to me 
one day," he says, " as I was at the Prince of Wales's 
Court : ' I want to know you, Mr. Sterne, but it is fit you 
should know also who it is that wishes that pleasure. You 
have heard of an old Lord Bathurst, of whom your Popes and 
Swifts have sung and spoken so much. I have lived my life 
with geniuses of that caste, but have survived them ; and 
despairing ever to find their equals, it is some years since I 
have cleared my accounts and shut up my books, with 
thoughts of never opening them again. But you have 
kindled a desire in me of opening them once more before I 
die, which now I do : so go home and dine with me I' " 

Sterne in his sermons was satirical on Methodists, Quak- 
ers, and Roman Catholics. He speaks of the former as 
"illiterate mechanics, who, as a witty divine said of them, 
were much fitter to 'make a pulpit than to get into one, able 
so to frame their nonsense to the nonsense of the times, as 
to beget an opinion in their followers, not only that they 
prayed and preached by inspiration, + but that the most com- 
mon actions of their lives were set about in the Spirit of the 
Lord." X He goes on to say, that the opinions of the Meth- 
odists are but a republication, with some alterations, of the 
extravagant conceits of Quakers, which he regards as en- 
thusiastic. "The truest definition," he writes,§ "you can 
give of Popery is, that it is a system put together and con- 
trived to operate upon men's weaknesses and passions, and 
thereby to pick their pockets, and leave them in a fit condi- 
tion for its arbitrary designs." In his next sermon he still 
further attacks the Pvoman Catholics and Methodists, charg- 
ing the latter with more than papal uncharitableness. 

* Lord Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, vol. v. p. 434. 

t The case of Norton v. Kelly, referred to in Lord Campbell's Life 
of Lord Northington, is a very remarkable one of religious imposture. 
The defendant, among other inducements, had written to the plaintilf, 
a lady, " Your former pastor has^ I hear, excommunicated yoU' ; but put 
yourself in my congregation, wherein dwells the fullness of God." The 
invariable style of his letters was, " all is to be completed by love and 
union." Lord Northington, then Lord Henley, concludes, " One of 
his counsel, with some ingenuity, tried to shelter him under the denom- 
ination of ' an independent preacher.'' I have tried in this decree to 
spoil his independency .f'' — Lives of the Chancellors, vol. v. p. 191. 

X Vol. ii. Sermon 25. 4 Sermon 37. 



212 DR. JOHNSON'S CHUROHMANSHIP. 

" Faith," he continues, " the distinguishing characteristic of 
a Christian, is defined by them, not as a rational assent of 
the understanding to truths which are estabhshed by indis- 
putable authority, but as a violent persuasion of the mind, 
that they are instantaneously become the children of God ; 
that the whole score of their sins is for ever blotted out, 
without the payment of one tear of repentance. Pleasing 
doctrine this to the fears and passions of mankind ; promising 
fair to gain proselytes of the vicious and impenitent I " 

It may be feared that there is too much truth in this re- 
mark of Sterne's ; and perhaps it may not be unapplicable 
to some preachers in the Church of England. We do not 
desire that dissenters should bear the whole blame of ad- 
vancing false doctrine or light conceits. But, turning from 
these accusations, we shall find a good deal of sterling sense 
in Sterne's sermons ; and there is one on the Thirtieth Day 
of January (the anniversary of the martyrdom of King 
Charles the First), which would not have been displeasing, 
in its sentiments, at least, to Dr. Johnson himself 

The notice of some inferior divines and writers may be 
passed by ; and we refrain also from entering on the contro- 
versy concerning Milton : Milton is in himself a giant, and 
the subject gigantic. Several of our leading divines are not 
iiarxied by Dr. Johnson in " Boswell's Life," but we can not 
argue from their omission that they were unknown to Dr. 
Johnson. It need only be stated, that the names do not ap- 
pear of Latimer, Ridley, Fuller, Andrewes, Mede, John 
Smith* (of Cambridge), Whitgift, Jackson,! Chillingworth, 
Hall, Cosin, Cudworth, Scott,t Stillingfleet, Beveridge, Bull, 
Ken, Bingham, Waterland, &c., &c., with others who form 
the glory of the church in theological literature, and its re- 
doubtable bulwark against the assaults of Rome on the one 
hand, and dissent, as well as infidelity, on the other. 

* So highly eulogized by Alexander Knox. 

t Jones of Nayland speaks of Dr. Jackson's works as " a magazine 
of theological learning, every where penned with great elegance and dig- 
nity, so that his style is a pattern of perfection." — LifeofBp. Horne^ p. 75. 

X Addison found out the virtues of Dr. John Scott, and describes his 
"Christian Life" as "one of the finest and most rational schemes of 
divinity that is written in our tongue, or in any other." — Spectator, 
No. 447, vol. vi, p. 194. 



CHAPTER XIII. 
LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOW. 

Men of high rank simply, gain honor to themselves by 
their notice of others who are eminent in the walks of liter- 
ature, whereas those who are celebrated both for rank and 
learning have less temptation to seek fame in this way; and, 
especially, the lasting fame of Lord Chancellors must mainly 
depend on the soundness of their legal decisions, and the 
part they may bear in the politics of the times in which 
they live. It is thus the more gratifying to find with what 
high regard Lord Chancellor Thurlow contemplated the 
literary exertions of Dr. Johnson, and sought, in an hour of 
apparent need, to meet his wishes, at the request of friends. 
It must be remembered, too, that Johnson originally derived 
his pension from George the Third through the Marquis of 
Bute, to whom it was at first suggested by Lord Thurlow's 
rival, Mr. Wedderburn, afterward Earl of Loughborough. 
Thurlow, however might well be in good humor at this 
time ; for, but the year before, Lord Loughborough, who 
had been appointed First Commissioner when the Great 
Seal was put in Commission during the Coalition Ministry,* 
had been obliged, much to his chagrin, to deliver it up to 
his bitter and reckless opponent. 

Boswell observed rightly, when he addressed Lord Thurlow 
"as well assured of his lordship's, regard for Dr. Johnson;" 
for his lordship, in answer, speaks highly of Johnson's merit, 
and the reflection it would be on all if such a man should 
perish for want of the means to take care of his health ; and 
to Sir Joshua Reynolds his lordship writes of the pleasure 
he felt in contributing to the health and comfort of a man, 
"whom," he says, "I venerate sincerely and highly for every 
part, without exception, of his exalted character." Johnson, in 
* Fox aiul Lord Nuilh, umler the Duke of Portland. 1783. 



214 LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOW. 

turn, asserted that he was proud to own his obhgations to 
"such a mind ; " and concluded his letter to his lordship, say- 
ing, "I have received a benefit which only men like you are 
able to bestow. I shall now live, mihi carior, with a higher 
opinion of my own merit." 

More than a year before, he had said, "Depend upon it, 
sir, it is when you come close to a man in conversation that 
you discover what his real abilities are : to make a speech in 
a public assembly is a knack. Now I honor Thurlow, sir : 
Thurlow is a fine fellow : he fairly puts his mind to yours." 

And both of these great men resembled each other in some 
respects ; the want of religion in one, and the possession of it 
in the other, constituting a marked difi'erence. Both were 
rebellious, in college days, against the respective authorities ; 
both were thorough clubbists ; and Thurlow, as Lord Camp- 
bell remarks, "like his contemporary. Dr. Johnson, took great 
pains in gladiartorial discussion," and both were acknowledged 
to be "lions"* in their chosen and distinguished paths of 
life. Of Thurlow, too, it is recorded, as well as it has been 
of Johnson, that " however rough he might be with men, he 

* " An olil, IVee-speaking comparnion of his (Thurlow's), well known 
at Lincoln's-inn, would say, ' I met the great Law Lion this morning, 
going to Westminster, and bowed to him ; but he was so busy reading 
in his coach what his provider had supplied him with, that he took no 
notice of me.' " " So fiercely did he spring on a luckless counsel or 
solicitor, that he general!)' went by the name of the ' Tiger ; ' and some- 
times the)'' would, out of compliment, call him the 'Lion,' adding, that 
Hargrave was his provider. This was the learned editor of Coke upon 
Littleton." — Lord Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, vol. v. p. 633, 
522. 

In no part of Johnson's life and habits could he, by any conceit, be 
denominated " Tiger." No ; he was the veritable " Lion " all through 
his career, and in the generous and sublime tenor of his arduous life 
surpasses Thurlow. 

On fighting a duel, Thurlow is described as standing up to his adver- 
sary like an elephant. His physical courage, like Johnson's, was great; 
but the latter could not explain "the rationality of dueling." 

The excellent William Wilberforce has this entry in his Diary ; " At 
the levee, and then dined at Pitt's — sort of cabinet dinner — was often 
thinking that pompous Thurlow, and elegant Carmarthen, M'ould soon 
appear in the same row with the poor fellow who waited behind their 
chairs." — Life of Wilberforce., by his Sons. 



LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOVV. 215 

was the politest person in the world to ladies." And the 
following words spoken by a kinsman of Lord Thurlow, might 
be justly applied to Johnson ; and, indeed, are almost the 
counterpart of what he did say of himself: "He could assume 
the sternest character, if necessary, or the sweetest smile I 
ever beheld This stern exterior was, I have often thought, 
put on to cover the most kind and feeling heart : and his real 
nature was but little known, but to those who had the happi- 
ness of living in his society." There was something so terri- 
ble in Thurlow' s look and voice (as described by Lord Camp- 
bell), and he spoke with so much emphasis his pointed severi- 
ties, that often his object was gained without real argument ; 
yet. Dr. Johnson was his superior, if we may trust a con- 
temporary, in effectiveness. Craddock, who knew both inti- 
mately, says, " I was always more afraid of Johnson than of 
Thurlow : for though the latter was sometimes very rough 
and course, yet the decisive stroke of the former left a mortal 
wound behind it." Many, indeed, quailed before both these 
great conversationists : and Home Tooke, one of the best 
talkers of his time, was quite overawed by Thurlow's look and 
tone of voice alone : he was (it may be said to theological 
readers) the Atterbury both of law courts and of society. 
Lord Thurlow, in common with Johnson, dared to let his 
poverty, or the lowness of his parentage, be known. He had 
a just contempt, Lord Campbell tells us, for the vanity of 
new men pretending that they are of ancient blood ; and 
some one, attempting to flatter him by trying to make out 
that he was descended from Thurloe, Cromwell's secretary, 
Avho was a Suffolk man, " Sir," said he, " there were two 
Thurlows in that part of the comitry, who flourished about the 
same time : Thurloe the secretary, and Thurlow the carrier. 
I am descended from the last." Yet, when in the House of 
Lords he was reproached with his plebeian extraction, by the 
Duke of Grafton, how nobly, after stating the dignities to 
which he had, by his own exertions, arrived, he said, " Nay, 
even in that character alone, in which the noble duke would 
think it an affront to be considered — as a man — I am at this 
moment as respectable — I beg leave to add, I am at this 
moment as much resoected — as the proudest neer I now Innl.- 



216 LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOVV. 

down upoa." And we are informed that he was ever more 
cautious of speaking ofi'ensively among inferiors than among 
the great.* 

Lord Thurlow never wrote a book, not even a pamphlet , 
but he seems to have been fond of literary society. After 
his entire ejection from office, he consoled his mind with 
classical literature, and a voracious reading of novels ; and, 
in one instance, so interested was he in the plot, that he 
dispatched his groom from Dulwich to London, after ten 
o'clock at night, for the concluding volume, that he might 
know the fate of the heroine before trying to go to sleep. 
Other great politicians and lawyers, such as Fox and Sir 
James Macintosh, have found time to peruse nearly all this 
species of the lighter literature of their day : a kind of read- 
ing which is, in some degree, now superseded by the enlarged 
newspapers. He admired and venerated Dr. Johnson, and 
befriended Crabbe : but, to his shame, overlooked the poet 
Cowper, who, to the last, affectionately adored him. Per- 
haps the poet's lines against the iniquitous slave-trade, a 
matter on which Thurlow spoke strongly, prevented the 
patronage of the Lord Chancellor : and we know that his 
lordship also disliked, what he styles, " your pious heroes." 
He might have tolerated Johnson's religious views, but those 
of CoM'per would have been to him, we may fear, mere cant 
and verbiage. Thurlow was not a religious man ; probably 
he was a skeptic : and in his disappointed old age he missed 
the consolations of religion, together with all the fortitude 
and resignation of character that it inspires. The difference 
of disposition with which Lord Hardwicke bore the loss of 
the highest judicial office, and his anxious concern only for 
the good of his country, place him in amiable contrast with 
Thurlow ; although the former seems not to have cultivated 
either religion or classical literature, and certainly to have 
behaved in an inconsiderate, if not heartless manner, toward 
Thomson the poet, who, like himself, was a Whig in politics, 
and who wrote nothing, as in the case of Cowper, which 
could have been offensive to his opinions. Lord Hardwicke 
was a better lawyer, and a milder and more consistent man 
* Campbell, p. 661. 



LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOW. 217 

than Thurlow, throughout his career ; but he scorned or 
neglected hterary men,* and they have, in consequence, not 

* Not thus was it with another ennobled lawyer. Lord Campbell, 
in his " Lives of the Chief Justices of England," says of Murray (after- 
ward Lord Mansfield), "The new Solicitor General and M.P found a 
mortifying ditl^ieulty in keeping up the intercourse he wished with his 
literary associates : and Pope, when publishing a new edition of the 
" Dunciad," introduced him (although with respect and tenderness), 
among those who, from their classical attainments and their genius, 
might have gained high intellectual distinction^ but who had sunk into 
lawyers and politicians.''^ 

Lord Mansfield was a wonderful man, but he could not contend with 
Lord Chatham, who to fiery genius joined great eloquence, and signal 
moral and physical courage. Pope presented Murray with a miniature 
portrait of Betterton the celebrated actor, painted by himself It is to 
be feared this invaluable relic of Pope's art in painting was destroyed 
when Lord Mansfield's house was set fire to by the rioters in 1780. 

Bishop Warburton observed, " Mr. Pope had all the warmth of 
affection for this great lawyer, and indeed no man ever more deserved 
to have a poet for his friend," &c. Pope, JNIurray, Bolingbroke, and 
Warburton, on one occasion dined together in Lincoln's Inn Fields 
(Murray's residence), and " O for a Bosv^-ell," exclaims Lord Campbell, 
"to have given us their conversation !" 

Hannah More tells a good anecdote of Pitt. " In the midst of all 
these cares and distractions," she says, "a friend of mine called on Pitt 
the other night. He found him alone, gay and cheerful, his mind 
totally disjengaged from the scenes in which he had passed the day. He 
was reading Milton aloud with great emphasis, and he said his mind 
was so totally engaged in Paradise, that he had forgotten there were any 
people in the world but Adam and Eve !''' 

Hannah More subjoins, '• This seems a trifle, but it is an indication 
of a great mind, so entirely to discharge itself of such a load of care, 
and to find pleasure in so innocent and sublime an amusement." 
Memoirs of Hannah More, vol. ii. p. 142. 

Shall it be said of the immortal William Pitt, what we have written 
of Edmund Burke and George Canning in the fourteenth page of this 
book ? 

This anecdote is told of one, not of the same calibre as Pitt. 

There is a monumental inscription beneath the statue of Pitt in 

Guildhall, written by Canning. It closes after this manner, 

" Though Prime Minister during twenty years, 

He died poor." 

It is said the inscription was submitted to a Committee in the city of 

London for their approval. The Committee of course highly approved 

of it, but one of them modestly begged leave to suggest that instead of 

the words "He died poor," it might be better to substitute the words, 

'• He died in indigent circiniistances !"" 

K 



218 LORD CHANCELLOR THHRLOW. 

remembered him ; aud the legal, as well as the military hero, 
will not descend in universal fame to posterity without the 
aid of the poet. Out of a thousand men who now know the 
name, and reverence the mind of Dr. Johnson, not ten may 
be acquainted with the name or talent of Lord Hardwicke, 
and we may well suppose, that those who are acquainted 
with Lord Hardwicke's name, know that of Johnson also ; 
while the vast number to whom Johnson s name is a familiar 
word, absolutely have never heard the name of Hardwicke. 
Hear Lord Campbell :* " With all his titles, and all his 
wealth, how poor is his fame in comparison of that of his 
contemporary, Samuel Johsnon, whom he would not have 
received at his Sunday evening paiiies in Powis House, or 
invited to hear his state stories at Wimpole's !" And with 
what nobleness of disposition, manifesting that he possesses 
" a soul above buttons," does Campbell add : " A man desir- 
ous of solid fame M'ould rather have written the ' Rambler,' 
the ' Vanity of Human Wishes,' ' Rasselas,' or the ' Lives of 
the Poets,' than have delivered all Lord Hardwicke's speeches 
in Parliament, and all his judgments in the Court of Chan- 
cery, although the author had L^n sometimes obliged to pass 
the night on the ashes of a glass-house, and at last thought 
himself passing rich with his £300 pension, while the peer 
lived in splendor, and died worth a million." And he 
further adds in a note, " Hardwicke is to Johnson as the 
most interesting Life that could be written of Lord Hard- 
wicke is to Boswell's ' Life of Johnson :' the proportion of a 
farthing candle to the meridian sun." With how peculiar a 
grace and worth do such sentences proceed from the pen of a 
man of Lord Campbell's eminent knowledge and practice of 
law I though it is from eminent men that we look for noble- 
minded language ; and they are the more valuable, inasmuch 
,l# -Me was not led away by a blind or bigoted admiration t 
of the giant in literature. No one can read Lord Campbell's 

^ * Vol. V. p. 167, Life of Lord Hardwicke. 

I t As where he prefers the pithy conclusion of a memorable speech 
of Lord Hardwicke's, as given in Archbishop Seeker's manuscript 
notes, to the more lengthened paraphrastic rendering of Dr. Johnson. 
See p. 88. 



LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOW. 219 

" Lives of the Chancellors" without predicting an immortality 
to his own name, not only as accruing from the fame of the 
illustrious personages described, but more from the full and 
interesting details given after great research, and the generous 
as well as just remarks, which accompany their histories ; 
truly affording to the intelligent of each successive generation 
a book not only of instruction and learned information, but 
also of exceeding entertainment and delight. Fox thought 
that no man could be so wise as Thurlow looked, and neither 
can we imagine the generation to come that would be, or 
look, too wise to relish these volumes of biography. Still 
Johnson, single-handed, will ever attract more of the atten- 
tion of posterity than any one of the Chancellors, or probably 
than all of them put together ; yet he, even in his hey-day 
of fame, could not help for a moment wishing that he had 
been a "law lord." Had he been one, he would have been 
distinguished indeed, if we only form a judgment from the 
cases he drew up for Mr. Boswell ; and we may say, with 
great degree of certainty, that he would have attained that 
eminence which would have placed him in the fortunate 
category of having had Campbell as his biographer. From 
the period of this pattern of all judicial excellence, entire 
freedom from corruption and bribery has been continued. 
Lord Campbell says, " Spotless purity, not only an absence 
from bribery and corruption, but freedom from undue influ- 
ence, and an earnest desire to do justice, may at that time, 
and ever afterward, be considered as belonging to all English 
judges." This was not the case before. 

Old Hugh Latimer, the ever honest and fearless bishop, 
mercilessly attacked the proud and venal judges of his time.* 

* During the same reign (Edward the Sixth), that celebrated clergy- 
man, Bernard Gilpin, preaches against the same corruptions, in the 
same plain and uncomprising manner as Hugh Latimer, as we learn 
from his notable sermon preached before the king, on the first Sunday 
after the Epiphany, 1552, from the text of Luke ii. 41—50. It required 
true moral courage in both of them to preach, as they so firmly did, 
against the overwhelming corruption and carelessness that prevailed 
among all classes of nobility, of judges, magistrates, and ministers, in 
those times ; and the anecdote of the Bishop of Worcester, in regard 
to his befriending the cause of the poor man, must be well known. 



220 LORD CHANCELLOR THURLOW. 

He could not abide their velvet coats and upskips, but be- 
sought the Lord Protector himself to hear causes. " View 
your judges," he says in his second Sermon, " and hear poor 
men's causes. And you, proud judges, hearken what God 
saith in his holy book. ' Hear ye the poor,' saith he, ' as 
well as the rich.' Mark that saying, thou proud judge I 
Hell will be full of such judges, if they repent not and 
amend." In his third Sermon, he tells the story of Camby- 
ses, who avenged a poor widow by ordering the judge to be 
flayed, and his skin to be laid on the chair of judgment, that 
all judges afterward should sit on the same skin. " Surely 
it was a goodly sign," says Latimer, "the sign of the judge's 
skin. I pray God we may once see the sign of the skin in 
England." In his fifth Sermon, he again lashes them. 
"If a judge," he says, "should ask me the way to hell, I 
would show him this way ; first by covetousness, then bribes, 
then perverting of judgment : but there lacks a fourth 
thing," he continues, " to make up the mess, which, so God 
help me, if I were judge, should be a Tyburn tippet. Were 
it the judge of the King's Bench, my Lord Chief Justice of 
England, yea, were it my Lord Chancellor himself, to Tyburn 
with him." Happily, in no modern instance have Latimer's 
coarse words been needed ; both Hardwicke and Thurlow 
were honest as the day, as regards such charges ; but, me- 
thinks, more than to these, Johnson's own lines would have 
applied to himself, had he ever become a retiring chancellor, 

" Calm con.science then his former life survey'd, 
And recollected toils endear'd the shade, 
'Till Nature called him to the general doom, 
And virtue's sorrow dicrnified his tomb." 




CHAPTEP^ XIV. 

OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

Dr. Johnson, it must be remembered, lived during a 
period when dissent, in great degree, was rather a commenc- 
ing than an established institution : perhaps it is more cor- 
rect to say, that it was a revival of an old error : great 
lethargy had crept into the dissent that already existed, as 
well as into the sanctuaries of the church ; and religion gen- 
erally, as with the Mediaeval church, was to all appearance 
in a state of suspended animation. There was need, then, 
that a spirit should go forth, and lift up a great cry, ay, bet- 
ter to utter very screams over the seeming corpse, than to 
leave it alone to the gaze of an exulting and scoffing nation. 
Hence, perhaps more within than without the church, a loud 
shout of awakening from slumber arose; theVenns, Romaines, 
Topladys, Berridges, Walkers, Herveys, Madans, Newtons, 
&c., breathed the breath of life into the dry bones on one 
side of doctrinal excitement, with the external help of Whit- 
field, Doddridge, Ingham, Harris, Cennick, Rowland Hill, 
&c., all Calvinists to the backbone, whom Lady Huntingdon 
so largely favored, and Horace Walpole elegantly caricatured ; 
while, still in the church, Wesley, Fletcher of Madeley, and 
their followers took the field, and with more zeal than 
judgment, preached to the multitudes of the nation, with 
extreme energy what they conceived to be the vital doctrines 
of the blessed Gospel ; and from the exertions of all these, 
churchmen and dissenters arose, stood upon their feet, an 
exceeding great and imposing army. 

Still, this was a convulsive coming to life of the corpse — 
it was a galvanic resuscitation — inwardly with all the agony 
of returning sensation to a drowned man, and outwardly 
with all the grimace and tortuous writhing which would at- 
tend on the reviving work within. No wonder, then, that 



222 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

much occurred which would tend to horrify and scare sober 
and pious Christians : for many would say, Let us retire 
awhile and not gaze upon these dreadful contortions of the 
countenance, and these awful strugglings of the body with 
its returning inner life; let us wait until health be restored, 
the face calm and rational, the body sound and standing 
erect in perfect strength ; for, while a process is required of 
which we stand in no need, let the proper physicians and at- 
tendants gather round, but let not us, who can do no good, 
go and indulge a morbid curiosity, and which ultimately 
might, in the common sympathy of our uncertain nature, 
effect harm within our own minds and souls, by seducing us 
from soberness and settledness into eccentricity and discon- 
tentedness. For in these days, it must be borne in mind, 
there were very many real Christian hearts beating in the 
church with all the faith, hope, and charity, of which Chris- 
tian men are capable : and to these, the new doings, and 
the new processes of alarming and arousing the dead and 
slumbering ones, seemed to partake of much of the hideous 
and the horrible. It was what Mrs. Radcliffe and her crew 
were to the common world of readers, not only alluring them 
from the perusal of wholesome and rational literature, but 
rendering them fearful of their own selves and of all other 
people : afraid to walk out by day, or sit in the house by 
night ; and when the dread hour of midnight arrived, and 
the clock struck one, oh what fearfulness and trembling, 
what apparitions, hollow groans, and shrieks of subterraneous 
victims, at once agonizing and appalling ! and rendering the 
poor creatures incapable of the exercise of the truly heroic and 
milder virtues of fortitude, resignation and discretion. 

Now Dr. Johnson was one of the soberly religious minds 
of the age. He looked upon the church as a loyal establish- 
ment, guiding the solid and prudential convictions of man- 
kind for the present existence, and assuredly teaching that 
line of doctrine, and exhorting to that kind of disposition, 
which must certainly be adapted for the heavenly and eter- 
nal life. He could not abide the carnal excitements and 
eccentricities of men ; and instead of standing in a street, or 
on a common, to list to the fire and eloquence of a Whit- 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 223 

field, he would have said with David, in his own resolute 
and self-humbling way, " But as for me, I will come into 
Thine house, even upon the multitude of Thy mercy : and 
in Thy fear will I worship toward Thy holy temple." 

But while all this amazing and confounding work was 
going on in English districts. Dr. Johnson had an opportu- 
nity of witnessing a more sober and decent settlement oi" dis- 
sent in Presbyterian Scotland ; for even Adam Clarke had 
not yet set foot on the Shetland Isles. We can collect, then 
Dr. Johnson's opinion of two kinds of religious teaching, 
Presbyterianism and Methodism, more to be treated of now 
than the evangelical resurrection, or as he might have term- 
ed it ««surrection, within the pale of the church ; and while 
we know that he, as a devout Christian, would have wished 
to have seen one church and one faith existing, and to have 
witnessed all men alive to the solemn requirements and re- 
alities of these, as bearing on that practical godliness which 
has the promise of the life that now is, as well as of that 
which is to come, we shall at the same time see the manner 
of his temper toward the existing contrarieties, and the senti- 
ments that proceeded, often abruptly, from his mighty intel- 
lect : a temper and intellect that could not suppress an opin- 
ion from false motives ; that could not keep back the warn- 
ing words of charity, through lear of the bugbear accusation 
of intolerance or bigotry. No, he must cherish a strong 
thought ; he must have a decided side ; he must hold the 
truth, and give a cause. His illustrious friend Burke has 
said well, and the comment of an earnest divine* may also 
be given, " That those persons should tolerate all opinions 
who think none to be of estimation, is a matter of small 
merit. Equal neglect is not impartial kindness. The spe- 
cies of benevolence which arises from contempt, is not true 

* Hugh James Rose, who continues on Indifference, "Where that 
flourishes and abounds, nothing else will ; for it dries up every source 
of fertility, the gushing spring of human affections, the gentle dew of 
grace from heaven. There will be no love : no love of man, no love 
of God .... no gratitude for deliverance, no love of the deliverer, no 
zeal for his honor, no desire, and no readiness, to act, or to suffer for 
it, or for the good of man." Sermon 6, pi-eached before the University 
of Cambridge. 



224 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

charity." " What, then," observes Rose, "is its true name? 
It is, simply, indifference ; and from indifference cometh no 
good thing I Come any thing but that I Come the wild 
dreams of superstition ; come the savage excesses of the en- 
thusiast ; come the stern rigors of the fanatic ; which, with 
all their evils, still leave the heart something to love and rev- 
erence, still leave it unabated trust in good and the Author 
of good ; but come not withering, palsying hand of ' indiffer- 
ence' upon the Christian's heart !" Dr. Johnson's profound- 
ness of investigation, and the active, constraining principles 
of religion ever moving his heart and influencing his conduct, 
give a loud lie to any charge of indifference ; and very often 
it may be, that the very warmth and intenseness of a man's 
feelings on the question of all questions, lays him open to an 
accusation of bigotry and intolerance from the more superficial 
and less considerate minds of the period in which he showed 
his strong attachment to a righteous and all-important cause. 

The first great question to be settled, is that of toleration, 
or religious liberty. Too often this matter is rather decided 
by numbers and force, than by right and peace. Dissentients 
increase, and privileges which were denied to them when 
they were few, must now be granted. But, without paying 
deference to the few or the many, the question is, on which 
side does the right lie? for the multitude is usually tyranni- 
cal, and therefore the protection of the few is often, and al- 
ways should be in cases of persecution, the aim and act of 
the law in every country possessing a free constitution. 

Dr. Johnson held, that every society has a right, through 
its agent, the magistrate, to preserve public peace and order, 
and therefore to prevent the propagation of opinions which 
have a dangerous tendency. The magistrate might be theo- 
logically or morally wrong in prohibiting the extension of 
certain opinions, but he would be politically right. Peace, 
order, and the conformity to the rules of society, are the 
first things to be cared for. Dr. Maj'o said, " I am of opinion, 
sir, that every man is entitled to liberty of conscience in re- 
ligion ; and that the magistrate can not restrain that right." 

Johnson answered, " Sir, I agree with you. Every man 
has a right to liberty of conscience, and with that the magis- 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 2^5 

trate can not interfere.* People confound liberty of thinking' 
with liberty of talking, nay, with liberty of preaching. Every 
man has a physical right to think as he pleases, for it can not 
be discovered how he thinks. He has not a moral right, for 
he ought to inform himself, and think justly. But, sir, no 
member of a society has a right to teach any doctrine con- 
trary to what the society holds to be true." 

If he does so teach, he also held, whether he be individ- 
ually right or wrong, he may be punished. 

In the above definition of liberty of conscience. Dr. John- 
son appears too confined. True, a man may think what he 
likes, because no man can tell what another man's thoughts 
are, but it is liberty to expression of thought that is contended 
for. At the same time, we can very plainly see, that no 
man should be permitted " to teach any doctrine contrary to 
what the society holds to be true." No, a man could not 
conscientiously do so ; he must, of necessity, go out of the so- 
ciety ; but will the society, or any other party, have a right to 
persecute him after he is gone out ? Thus the first Christians 
came out from among the Jews, and the Protestants from among 
the Roman Catholics : for the same persons could not teach 
Christianity and remain as Jews, or propagate the tenets of 
Protestantism and hold with the E-oman Catholic Church. 

Dr. Mayo, however, was perplexed, and replied to Dr. 
Johnson, " Then, sir, we are to remain always in error, and 
truth never can prevail ; and the magistrate was right in 
persecuting the first Christians." 

* Lord Mansfield said (and his speech was heartily approved of by 
Lord Camden), " Conscience, my lords, is not controllable by human 
laws, nor amenable to human tribunals. Persecution, or attempts to 
force conscience, will never produce conviction, and can only be calcu- 
lated to make hypocrites or martyrs." — Lord CampbelVs Lives of the 
Chancellors, vol. v. p. 238. 

Acasto (Otway's Orphan, gives idle rules to his family for their con- 
duct in life, calculated to produce misanthropy, rendering them odious : 

" If you have religion, keep it to yourselves : 
Atheists will else make use of toleration, 
And laugh you out on't." 

Yet, we may ask with satisfaction, Are there not fewer atheists now 
than in the time of Charles the Second ? 



226 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

Johnson answered, " Sir, the only method by which relig- 
ious truth can be established is by martyrdom. The magis- 
trate has a right to enforce what he thinks, and he who is 
conscious of the truth has a right to suffer. I am afraid 
there is no way of ascertaining the truth but by persecution 
on the one hand, and enduring it on the other." 

This is perfectly true in regard to the state of the civil law 
in most countries, and also in relation to our own country 
during Dr. Johnson's time; but surely now there is no civil 
persecution so long as the feelings and privileges of society 
are not outraged, there is perfect toleration for Jews, Unita- 
rians, Roman Catholics, Swedenborgians, Mormonists, &c., or 
any other sect that may arise ; only there may be a species 
of private and domestic persecution or irritation which no 
civil law can reach or prevent. The test of martyrdom is 
over as regards resistance to, or non-compliance with the 
authorities of the country. 

Dr. Johnson proceeded to define the gradation of thinking, 
preaching, and action. At last a gentleman wished to know, 
Whether there was not a material difference as to toleration 
of opinions which lead to action, and opinions merely specu- 
lative ? For instance, would it be wrong in the magistrate 
to tolerate those who preach against the doctrines of the 
Trinity ? The doctor was at first offended by the introduc- 
tion of such a subject in a mixed society, but afterward re- 
plied, " Why then, sir, I think that permitting men to preach 
any opinion contrary to the doctrine of the Established Church, 
tends, in a certain degree, to lessen the authority of the church, 
and, consequently, to lessen the influence of religion." " It 
may be considered," said the gentleman, " whether it would 
not be politic to tolerate in such a case." Johnson. — " Sir, 
we have been talking of right ; this is' another question. I 
think it is not politic to tolerate in such a case." 

Yet, if it be proved that men have a right to hold and to 
express different religious opinions, no matter what the relig- 
ious opinions be, it must be right to tolerate the holding and 
expression of those opinions. Our Lord and His apostles 
never compelled any one to believe what He or they ad- 
vanced : all was invitation, beseeching, persuasion. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS, 2:7 

St. Paul speaks of those whose mouths must be stopped 
(Titus i. 11), that is, they must be confuted by sound argu- 
ments ; and if they were afterward to be silenced by episco- 
pal authority, we may be sure that the apostle never meant 
that compulsion, in the absence of earnest persuasion, should l)e 
resorted to. He also delivered over Hymenseus and Alexander 
unto Satan on account of their false doctrine, or apostasy ; 
these were men who spoke evil (^j3Xaa(j)rjfj,elv, 1 Tim. i. 20), 
of the truth, and therefore could not, of course, be regarded 
as members of a community that held the truth, i.e., the 
religion of Christ. Such men could not, at this time, either 
in conscience or in reason, be members of the Christian 
church. 

But no one regarded the freedom of the will more than our 
blessed Lord : Ye will not come unto me, was his pathetic 
lamentation. We can well understand that differences of 
opinion must not only weaken a church, or ruin a sect, but 
also, act, in a great degree, to the detriment of religion, es- 
pecially where the differences are not managed with temper : 
but still, unity of opinion should be voluntary to be of any 
avail, and any system of compulsion used for agreement, 
would be productive of far worse evils than the permission 
of contrariety of creed could bring about :* indeed, but for the 

* When Dr. Courayer, a Roman Catholic clerg)'man, remarkable 
for his moderation, charity, and temper concerning religious affairs, fled 
to England after giving offense, by his publications, to the Cardinal De 
Noailles, he observed to Archbishop Wake, that England "was a bad 
country for a religious man to reside in, because of the unhappy dilfcr- 
ences in religion, by which mutual charity is destroyed ; and the liber- 
ty which many take of speaking against the doctrines of Christianity, 
and corrupting the minds of the people." — Bowyer, p. 84. 

Courayer's work on the Validity of the Ordinations of the English 
(Rivingtons), is pretty well known. He says in his Preface, " The 
thing in question is no less than to know whether the Church of En- 
gland, formerly so illustrious, and even now so respectable, for the en- 
lightenment of her prelates and the erudition of her clergy, is without 
a succession, without a hierarchy, and without a ministry." He also 
says, " Having always found in the greater part of the members of the 
Church of England great understanding, and a very extensive knowledge 
of ecclesiastical antiquity, &c., I reckon it my duty to do them the just- 
ice they deserve, and to open a way to peace, which our posterity will 
perhaps follow with more success." 



2;28 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

allowance of secession from a church, it ayouIcI be probable 
that the insincerity, lukewarmness, or impatience of restraint 
long pent up and increasing, would at last burst forth, and in 
its very fury destroy the church itself. 

At another time, when giving his usual opinion, that the 
s'tate has a right to regulate the religion of the people, who 
are the children of the state, he allowed, after looking to 
other states than our own, and alluding to a Brahmin in par- 
ticular, that he had got no further than this, " Every man 
has a right to utter what he thinks truth, and every other 
man has a right to knock him down for it. Martyrdom is 
the test." 

And in support of his distinction between liberty of con- 
science and liberty of teaching, he said, " Consider, sir, if you 
have children whom you wish to educate in the principles of 
the Church of England, and there comes a Quaker who tries 
to pervert them to his principles, you would drive away the 
Quaker. You would not trust to the predomination of right 
which you believe is in your opinions ; you will keep wrong 
out of their heads. Now the vulgar are the children of the 
state. If any one attempts to teach them doctrines contrary 
to what the state approves, the magistrate may, and ought 
to restrain him." 

As far as regards England this matter need not be debated, 
for the state allows its children to be taught as they please. 
The state does not wish to drive away the Quaker, or any 
other religionist. But, were it otherwise, we must bear in 
mind that there is little analogy in fact between children of 
a family, and children of the state. The one is young and 
unknowing : the other adult, and, for the most part, educated. 
A parent would probably leave the choice of religion open to 
his adult sons, and at all events, he would feel that it would 
be most undesirable to enforce it. A man may very well 
say, I wish to see toleration of all opinions among mankind 
at large, although I do not like to practice it in my own 
young family circle : I know well enough that the matured 
mind must be left to cherish its own sincere convictions, but 
at the same time I shall endeavor to train up my young 
children in those doctrines which my own conscientious con- 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 229 

victions assure me are right. May not this be said with 
reason, and consistency ? For while he claims a course of 
action for himself, he grants to others the right to pursue 
their course ; neither yielding one atom of what each believes 
to be the truth. 

Mr. Seward asked, " Would you restrain private conver- 
sation, sir ?" 

Johnson. — " Why, sir, it is difficult to say where private 
conversation begins, and where it ends. If we three should 
discuss even the great question concerning the existence of a 
Supreme Being by ourselves, we should not be restrained, for 
that would be to put an end to all improvement. But if we 
should discuss it in the presence of ten boarding-school girls, 
and as many boys, I think the magistrate would do well to 
put us in the stocks, to finish the debate there." 

Most certainly : but see here, on his own showing, the 
distinction between children in the domestic sense, and the 
children of the state !* He himself a child of the state. 

Boswell mentioned his having heard an eminent physician, 
who was himself a Christian, argue in favor of universal 
toleration, and maintain that no man could be hurt by another 
man's diflering from him in opinion. 

Johnson. — " Sir, you are to a certain degree hurt by know- 
ing that even one man does not believe." 

Such was his kindness. 

On the whole, we see that Dr. Johnson granted liberty of 
conscience, but not liberty to preach doctrines contrary to the 
belief of the essential ones of the Established Church. If a 

=* It may be said, " that the fact is overlooked that the majority of 
our population have no means of forming a right judgment. Sure to 
go wrong if left to themselves, are they to be left to themselves to go 
wrong, to preserve a theory of private judgment?" We can answer, 
You must do what you can to educate them in the right, and to per- 
suade them to adopt and follow what is right, but you can do no more ; 
you can not coerce them ; you can not treat grown-up persons (though 
in reality but children in understanding) as you would treat children. 
Dr. Johnson would have silenced the school-girls, but who could 
silence him ? And yet a wrong opinion issuing from Dr. Johnson's 
mouth would be far more dangerous than the same from the mouth of 
an illiterate person, or from one who had little or no influence on the 
minds of others. 



230 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

man did so, he should be prepared to suffer martyrdom ; and 
for this, as he said, should feel persuaded that he has a par- 
ticular delegation from Heaven. We have perfect and im- 
perfect obligations. " It is a duty to give to the poor ; but 
no man can say how much another should give to the poor ; 
in the same way it is a duty to instruct the ignorant, and of 
consequence to convert infidels to Christianity : but no man 
in the common course of things is obliged to carry this to 
such a degree as to incur the danger of martyrdom, as no 
man is obliged to strip himself to the shirt in order to give 
charity." Well, then, there must be the delegation from 
Heaven, and a man usually thinks he has this, so that this 
requirement abates little from the limits of toleration, or the 
obligations of martyrdom. 

And now a few words on toleration in general. In the 
first place, we may certainly hold that Scripture sanctions 
not the infliction of civil penalties in order to enforce an ex- 
ternal unity in religion. Scripture allows the Christian 
church a right of excommunication, but not a right over the 
property, liberty, or life of the excommunicated. All civil 
laws, then, for the prevention of schism, or for the extirpa- 
tion of religious opinions, are purely human ; and are only 
justifiable in those extreme cases in which the propagation of 
such opinions would be found to be detrimental to the safety 
of society, or the preservation of its welfare and peace. 

Let the knowledge of this absence of Scriptural right be 
foremost in our minds, and let us own, that the very thing 
which the church can not scripturally perform by her own 
legislature when existent, she can not consistently do by that 
which is now her legislature, the Houses of Parliament. In 
times past, we know that if a Calvinist in one country, or a 
Jesuit in another, were caught preaching, they were put to 
death ; or if men doubted on the matter of transubstantiation, 
they were burned ; and yet, if we look at the severest pas- 
sages in Scripture, that of Deut. xiii. 1—10, " If among you 
a prophet arise," &c. ; or that of Matt, xviii. 17, "If he 
neglect to hear the church," &c. ; or that of Titus iii. 10, 
" A man that is an heretic," &;c. ; we shall find that while 
the two latter only sanction expulsion from the ecclesiastical 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 231 

Bociety and individual companionship, the former, though in- 
volving a command for the summary infliction of death, yet 
is not applicable to these cases ; for neither the Calvinist, nor 
Jesuit, nor common Protestant, besought the people to follow 
strange gods. In violation, however, of the requirement for 
the carrying out of this command, and with no other Scrip- 
tural order more stringent, we are told that the Counselor 
Dubourg, the monk Jehan Cauvin (known to us as John 
Calvin), the Spanish physician Servetus, the Calabrian Gen- 
tilis, all worshiped the same God ; and yet, the president 
Minard caused Counselor Dubourg to be burned ; and Du- 
bourg's friends caused President Minard to be assassinated : 
John Calvin caused the physician Servetus to be roasted, and 
this act was approved of even by the mild and dispassionate 
Melancthon : and Calvin had likewise the consolation to be 
a principal means of bringing the Calabrian Gentilis to the 
block : and the successors of John Calvin burnt Anthony. 
It is well asked, Was it reason, or piety, or justice, that com- 
mitted these murders ? There was no sanction from the Word 
of God : for, from Deut. xiii. we could derive no authority for 
putting even infidels to death at the present time, any more 
than to stone the Sabbath-breaker, or the disobedient to parents. 
The law of toleration commends itself to reasoning minds, 
when it is considered, that the human mind is fallible and 
various. Even if a man could be warranted in saying that 
he thought himself to be absolutely right, and his neighbor 
to be wrong, still he must remember that men's minds are 
differently constituted, that their intellectual vision extends 
not to the same depth and distance, and that, hence, upon 
almost every conceivable subject there arises, and must arise, 
differences of opinion even among those who give themselves 
to study and inquiry. The more we become acquainted with 
mankind, and exercise our sagacity in determining character, 
the more we shall observe its original diversities : and it was 
the idea of an ancient historian,* that there is a wider dif- 
ference between the individuals of our kind, than what is 
discernible between creatures of a separate order : and a mod- 
ern writer,! who knew human nature well, asserts, that the 
* Plutarch. t Montaigne. 



232 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

distance is much greater between man and man, than be- 
tween man and beast. Surely, then, we must be prepared 
to expect great varieties of opinion necessarily to spring out 
of the differences of mind and disposition in the human race ; 
and to acknowledge, that it would be as hard to subject the 
mind to one way of thought, as it was infamously cruel to 
adapt the body to the bed of Procrustes. 

In physical and mathematical science the interference of 
authority has been found to be ridiculous, and men believe 
that the earth moves round beneath the sun although the 
Roman Catholic church would have had them believe, and 
Galileo teach otherwise. Why should we court its restraints 
in our inquiries after religious truth ? Better have partial 
enthusiasm, schism, and fanaticism, three dreadful evils, than 
the more dreadful ones of stagnation, compulsion, and ultimate 
torpor or death. It is by dispassionate discussion, and by 
the comparison and collision of opinions, that error, however 
popular, will be discarded, and the truth be best brought to 
light ; for wherever error is not exposed to the test of gen- 
eral examination, it may have an extensive and undisputed 
sway in secret, while the surest way of contracting its empire, 
is to grant facilities to the general power of investigating its 
character. On the other hand, let Truth ever stand for- 
ward without fear, concealment, or mystery, ready to chal- 
lenge inquiry : and whatever can not be maintained by 
knowledge and reason should not be allowed to seek even a 
feeble protection from judicial severities. It must never be 
denied, but that every Christian ought to believe as the 
church of Christ believes, provided the church be true : but 
the question is. Which is that true church ? And when that 
is answered, as a man may unlawfully execute a lawful sen- 
tence, so he may falsely believe as the true church believes : 
for if I believe what she believes, only because she believes it, 
and not because I am convinced in my understanding and 
conscience of the truth of what she believes, my faith is fal- 
tering, though hers be true : it is not intrinsically true to 
me, because I have no evidence of it : it is taken rather 
upon trust, and what is taken upon the trust of one, may 
soon be transferred upon the trust of another. In short, I 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 233 

must believe as the true church beheves, yet not because she 
so beheves, but for the same reasons that she herself does so 
believe, because none can truly believe as she believes, but 
must do so upon the same principles and motives for which 
they believed that first made up that Christian church.* 
Once rob me of the liberty of my choice, the use of my un- 
derstanding, the distinction of my judgment, and no religion 
comes amiss ; indeed it leads to no religion. It was the 
saying of Charles the First to the then Prince of Wales, 
" Make the religion of your education the religion of your 
judgment ;" which seems to be of the nature of an appeal 
from his education to his judgment about the truth of his 
religion : and we may depend upon it, that any portion of 
religion which is too tender to be examined, is unsound, and 
our holding it is contradictory to apostolic injunction, Prove 
all things, hold fast tliat tvhich is good. St. Paul had no 
commission or power over conscience otherwise than reason- 
ing and persuasion gave him ; and how beautifully he wrote 
to the Corinthian Church, Not for that we luxve dominion 
over your fait] i, biit are helpers of your joy (2 Cor. i. 24) ; 
we are not persecutors : we use not, as Bishop Middleton 
observes on this text, the assumption of an arbitrary power, 
but rather, we are fellow- workers of your joy. 

In the second place, What good is gained by persecution? 

* It must be borne in mind, that persons of learning and leisure are 
hei-e spoken of ; and on these there rests a great responsibility, for they 
learn not only for themselves, but for others. Dr. Johnson said, " All 
intellectual improvement arises from leisure : all leisure arises from one 
working for another." He held truly, that if all were to work at man- 
ual labor, there would be no intellectual improvement. 

It is certain, that a great proportion of the poor have no reason for 
their faith. They could not give one proof that the Scripture is the 
Word of God, except that they were told so when they were children. 
Indeed many educated persons hold, and act upon many articles of faith 
because they have been so taught, not because they have canvassed the 
arguments on both sides, and made a deliberate choice. The Rev. John 
Venn (of Hereford) has handled this matter soundly jn his " Christian 
Ministry and Church Membership" (Hatchard), showing that life is not 
long enough for such discussions to the great bulk of mankind. Jeremy 
Taylor has some beautiful sentiments on this head, and speaks of being 
led by a small taper into an admirable and happy place. See Liberty 
of Prophesying^, Sec. 11—13, generally; also his Ductor Dubitantium. 



234 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

It produces no real change of opinion, but simply encourages 
the semblance of change. It tends to make men false and 
hypocritical ; dangerous to the state, because it is a maxim 
worthy of Caesar's notice, never to think him true to Ccesar, 
that i$ false to his oivn conscience ; and it does harm to re- 
ligion, by engaging men in its profession who will never adorn 
it by their practice. And to the Church of England, the 
most pure, learned, and apostolic church on the earth, it 
ought to be peculiarly abhorrent. If she practiced it, read- 
ily would it be said, not only by malevolent opponents, that 
she could not defend herself by the arguments of reason and 
truth, and the manifestation of her utility, seeing she called 
for the secular arm to put down her dissenting enemies. It 
would be an imitation, in different degree, of those men who 
bound themselves by a vow to kill St. Paul, because they 
could not answer his philosophy. It would be a humiliating 
confession that good-will opens not the way to men's hearts, 
and that those who are forced to belong to her are more 
worth having, than those who are incited purely by virtue and 
piety. Rather, would not the persecuted and persecutors be 
wretched neighbors one to the other ? The Indian Atabalipa 
rejected the Romish baptism because of the Spanish tyranny, 
whence it was usual with those poor Americans to desire 
that they might not go to heaven if the Spaniards went there, 
not heeding that there the wicked cease from troubling. No, 
the persecuted and the persecutors can only be friends in the 
sense of that case of the poor negro slave who was overheard 
praying for the conversion of his cruel master. It was 
stated by a writer,^ who knew well the feelings of the public 
mind, of the Act of Toleration which passed in the first year 
of William and Mary, " It is a known observation, that the 
dissenters are brought into the methods of life in common 
with the best and most polite people, and crowds of the gen- 
erations ivhich liave groivn up tinder the toleration have 
conformed to the church, from the humanity of that law. 
The fathers of families have, perhaps, found some pain in re- 
tracting their errors, and in going into new communities and 

* Sir Richard Steele. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 235 

conversations, but %oe see thousands mnnive at the conform- 
ity of their children ; the parents have been secretly pleased 
at their sliding into that economy, for which the fear of the 
imputation of self-interest, or apostasy, prevented them in 
their persons to declare." And the same change is apparent 
now. The repeal of the Corporation and Test Acts in the 
year 1828 has served to strengthen the church, and never 
was the Church of England so esteemed as at the present 
time ; showing, that free toleration of all religious sects is to 
her advantage, and that it is soundness and earnestness that 
in the long run prevail in the minds of the calm and rational 
majority of the nation. Lord Brougham, a man who would 
not endure an atom of religious persecution, has lately said,* 
" He had often confessed, that of all churches of which he 
had any knowledge, the English church was the most kind, 
the most peaceable, and the most tolerant, and even dissenters 
cheerfully confessed that she possessed all these attributes." 

Those Toleration Acts have given to the church a firmer 
basis of popular confidence than ever she before enjoyed, 
on a principle above suggested ; they are the safety valve, 
on the same principle, against national explosions. Let her 
ever act on such views ; and while she may think it neces- 
sary not to abolish all tests and subscriptions for union with 
herself, let her remember that these ought to be made, as 
Paley has laid down, as simple and easy as possible, always 
adapting themselves, in matters of unessential teaching, to 
altered circumstances ; and in regard to the admission, with- 
out distinction, of all good and competent Christian men to 
civil privileges and emoluments, she should never more offer 
any opposition, but rather rejoice, for her own sake, that the 
day of complete toleration, as spoken of by Archdeacon Paley, 
has ultimately arrived. And behold, in the words of the 
renowned Bishop Horsley, how consistent is attachment to 
the church with the toleration of others ; for thus the best 
of churchmen will ever speak : " Fixed, my lords, as I am 
in the persuasion that religion is the only solid foundation of 
civil society, and by consequence that an establishment of 

* House of Lords, May 22, 1849. 



23G OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

religion is an essential branch of every well constructed 
polity, I am equally fixed in another principle, that it is a 
duty which the great law of Christian charity imposes on 
the Christian Magistrate, to tolerate Christians of every de- 
nomination separated from the established church by consci- 
entious scruples, with the exception of such sects only, if any 
such sects there be, which hold principles, so subversive of 
civil government in general, or so hostile to the particular 
constitution under which they live, as to render the exterm- 
ination of such sects an object of just policy."* Happy the 
churchman, or rather, happy the man, be he churchman or 
dissenter, who strives to emulate the liberal and undaunted, 
yet ever judicious and devout spirit of Bishop Horsley I 

Let it not be thought that any attempt is here made to set 
a lesser value on the doctrines of the church of Christ, than 
on the laws of the land. It is especially commanded that 
the civil rulers shall not bear the sword in vain for the punish- 
ment of evil doers, but no such command in reference to the 
holding of Christian doctrine is given. A heretic is to be re- 
jected, expelled, without pains or penalties, from the ecclesi- 
astical body ; and that is all. The church is to show noth- 
ing but mercy : and while the state punishes its political 
schismatics with fine, and imprisonment, and transportation, 
and death, the church is only to proceed to the painful duty 
of excommunication for the benefit of the orthodox body, and 
with the hope that tlio ofiending one may be led to reflect on 
the article of belief that has caused his separate position, and, 
it may be, on fur< u ix investigation, to acknowledge that he 
has strayed from iKe truth. 

It must be remembered, that all disputes and divisions are 
to be lamented deeply, however proper and necessary it may 
be, for reasons above given, to tolerate them in their free ex- 
pression and act. Without unity of doctrine or government, 
without even so much of consent to the more essential points 

* Speech on the Second Reading of the Bill for the Relief of Roman 
Catholics, under certain conditions, May 31, 1791. The latter part of 
this sentence agrees with what Paley more fully lays down as the second 
case of exclusion by test laws. See Moral Philosophy, vol. ii. p. 341, 
20th. edit. 1814. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 237 

of Catholic truth as shall associate men in an unity of action,* 
while it permits in them a liberty of reserve as to other matters 
not of vital importance, it is not to be hoped that the chui'ch 
can either bring the baptized, in one holy fellowship, to the 
stature of the fullness of Christ, or fulfill the noble witness 
which was committed to her, in her corporate capacity, to bear 
to the world. And this conviction is the one which resist- 
lessly presents itself to the mind, and most distresses the heart 
of any Christian man taking an enlarged view of the present 
condition of Christ's church upon the earth. 

This consideration should lead men to be very careful in 
their reasons for separating from their brethren, whether it 
be from their brethren of the Established Church, or from 
their brethren who have formed themselves into a differ- 
ent establishment. " Schism," writes the Hon. Baptist Noel, 
" is division among the disciples of Christ, who, as one 
flock, one brotherhood, one body, ought to be united ; and those 
who cause this division are schismatics." Let us accept this 
definition of schism, uniting it with that of a worthier author- 
ity,! who defines schism to be the " forsaking external com- 
munion purely and orderly established in the church : " and 
let us allow, that there may be two parties in the encourage- 
ment of schism, those who require assent to matters unscrip- 
tural or inexpedient, and those who too readily dissent from a 
communion which is purely and orderly established. The 
former, in the words of Paley, have already been warned : 
with the latter we have now to do, with those who too 
hastily quarrel with institutions, and, liking to show their 
independence, rather follow after licentiousness of will than 
liberty of investigation : men who are slaves to passion and 
novelty, and thus prefer the changes of any of the invented 
sects rather than the primitive truths of the inherited church. 

Few men are intellectual and conscientious in their dissent, 
but wherever these are to be found, we must respect them. 
Dissenting leaders are constantly rebuking those of their 
followers who come not after them upon any conviction of 
mind as a matter of conscience, but merely from very inferior 

* Church of England Review. t Hooker. 



238 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS* 

motives.* Still whatever be the motive, they should practice 
toleration toward others, as they would wish it to be observed 
toward themselves. Yet we find too iiiany who are extremely 
sensitive in this respect themselves, lamentably regardless of 
it toward those who differ from them. " Toleration," says 
the Rev. Sydney Smith,! " is a great good, and a good to be 
imitated, let it come from whom it will. If a skeptic is toler- 
ant, it only shows that he is not foolish in practice as well as 
erroneous in theory. If a religious man is tolerant, it evinces 
that he is religious from thought and inquiry, because he ex- 
hibits in his conduct one of the most beautiful and import- 
ant consequences of a religious mind, an inviolable charity to 
all the honest varieties of human opinion." Dr. Arnold 
tells us of the "narrow spirit in things religious" which 
showed itself in the conscientious Puritans : and he noticed 
another kind of abuse of religious liberty, and says, '' To speak 
of liberty, when we mean the liberty to be irreligious ; or of 
freedom of conscience, when our only conscience is our con- 
venience, is no other than a mockery and a profanation.":): 
The quaint Fuller, alluding to the intolerance and unreason- 
ableness of the Puritan party, speaks of them as " those who, 
desiring most ease and liberty for their own sides when bound 
with episcopacy, now gird their own garment the closest about 
the consciences of others." 

What are we to think of those who fled from episcopal au- 
thority to New England, there to exercise the most dreadful 
kinds of persecution ? The coercive power of the magistrate 
was every thing, and those who ventured to oppose it were 
cruelly put down by their puritanical brethren. By that 
natural tendency of the human heart, says the historian § of 
this period, from the love of independence to that of tyranny, 
they changed their opinions as they changed the climate ; and 
only seemed to arrogate freedom of thought to themselves in 
order to deny it to others. This system was supported by the 

* " Intellectus humanus," says Lord Bacon, "luminis sicci non est ; 
sed recipit infusionem a voluntate et affectibus." — Novum Organunif 
lib. i. 

t Letters on the subject of Catholics, p. 119. 

J Lectures on Modern History, Lect. 6, p. 237. 

§ Abbe Raynal, vol. i. p. 109. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 23D 

severities of the law, which attempted to put a stop to every dif- 
ference in opinion, by i)7iposi?ig cajMal lyunishmcnt on all tvlw 
dissented ! Whoever was either convicted, or even suspected, 
of entertaining sentiments of toleration, was exposed to such 
cruel oppressions, that they were forced to fly from their first 
asylum, and seek refuge in another. The Quakers suffered 
severely from these dissenters, and the persecution was at 
last suppressed only hy the intervention of the mother country ! 

What are we to think of the Anabaptists, who, after they 
had carried fire and sword into a great part of Germany, 
under the idea of inspiration, at last thought themselves in- 
spired to compose a religious code, of which the following was 
the first Article : "In the mixed system of intolerance and 
mildness by which they are guided, the Anabaptist church, 
being the only one in which the pure word of God is taught, 
neither ca?i twr ought to cotnmmiicate ivith amj other !''* 
A portion of another article was, that the " baptism of infants 
is an invention of the devil and of the Pope I " forgetting that 
it was universally practiced before any Pope had ever existed. 

What are we to think of the intolerance (truly and strictly 
such) of the Solemn League and Covenant, which every 
Presbyterian teacher in Scotland is bound to sign " each one 

* An old Burtrher minister at Dalkeith preached against Wesley, 
affirming that if he died in his present sentiments he would be damned ; 
and the fanatic declared that he would stake his own salvation upon it. 
" The seceders," says Wesle)', " Who have fallen in my way, are more 
uncharitable than the Papists themselves. I never yet met a Papist 
who avowed the principle of murdering heretics. But a seceding min- 
ister being asked, ' Would not you, if it was in your power, cut the 
throats of all the Methodists ?' replied directly, ' Why, did not Samuel 
hew Agag m pieces before the Lord ? ' I have not yet met a Papist in 
this kingdom who would tell me to my face, all but themselves must be 
damned ; but I have seen seceders enough who make no scruple to af- 
firm, none but themselves could be saved!" — Southey's Life of Wesley, 
vol. ii. p. 384. 

In a work by a very able man (H. M. Elliot, Esq.), entitled Biblio- 
graphical Index to the Historians of Mtihanwiedan India, we have a 
strong instance of intolerance and bigotry in the person of Abdu-1-Kadir, 
who wrote a general History of India down to the fortieth year of the 
reign of the Emperor Aleban (Delhi), who was contemporary with our 
Queen Elizabeth. It is curious to see how he imagines every evil of 
the king's two ministers because they tolerated the religious ceremonies 
of the Hindus and Gu.p^-"';. 



240 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

of them for himself," and " ivith their hands lifted iqj to 
the Most High God, to sivear!" See in the second bellig- 
erent article, how they vow to fixtirpate whole churches 
opposed to their views and their forms of church government. 
In short, they make intolerance an article of their religious 
creed and action ; they sanctify their tongues and right arms 
with it ; they will not admit the exercise of toleration. This 
is very dreadful, and while we mourn over the excesses of a 
Chreighton, or a Claverhouse, we can not but acknowledge 
their temper and spirit of persecution to be verily incarnated 
in the Presbyterian body.* A Locke, a Grotius, an Arnold, 
could not take these oaths : the very idea would cause, as it 
were, a revulsion of the heart's blood in such men. What 
a free and noble system of religious liberty did our great phi- 
losopher form for Carolina : and blessed will be the time 
when the Grotian theory of union, indorsed by Arnold, shall 
be accepted willingly in the Christian church : and all your 
Solemn Leagues and Covenants, Westminster Confessions, 
Directories, &c., banished from men's lips and hearts for ever. 
For after all, it is not systems and creeds that make men 
tolerant, and merciful, and kind, but the inward heart of 
Christian love. " Good temper," exclaimed a bishop, " is 
three-fourths of Christianity." How beautifully Hooker said, 
" I take no joy in striving, I have not been trained up in 
it :" and he prays, that " no strife may ever be heard of 
again, but this, who shall hate strife most, also shall pursue 
peace and unity with swiftest paces." Jeremy Taylor saith 
well and kindly, " That a thing is not true, is not argument 
sufficient to conclude, that he that believes it true is not to 
be endured ;" that is, we ought to have no personal hatreds. 
And John Smith, of Cambridge, hits off the true Christian 
conduct, when he says, " There is a knowing of the truth as 
it is in Jesus, as it is in a Christ-like nature, as it is in that 
sweet, mild, humble, and loving spirit of Jesus, which spreads 
itself like a morning sun upon the souls of good men, full of 
light and life." It was a wise saying of Lord Coke, the 
renowned lawyer, " Whatever grief a man hath, ill words 

* To enter fully into Scottish pei-sccution, see Bramhall's Works, 
vol, iii. p. 241, &c. 



OPINIOiNS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 211 

work no good, and learned counsel never use them." And 
the good, and learned Robert Boyle,* had possessed himself 
with such an amiable view of religion, that he liked no nar- 
row thoughts, or superstitious practices, or sourness of parties, 
nor any nicety that occasioned divisions among Christians. 

In reading the above observations, let the distinction be- 
tween indifference and the genuine spirit of toleration be 
carefully marked. Some persons may be tolerant because, 
like Gallio, they care for none of these things ; they have 
little regard for any religion, and do not wish to know what 
is the truth, or what parties are best established in the truth. 
It is no credit to such persons to be tolerant ; their tolerance 
springs out of indifierence or indolence, or want of spiritual 
discernment. But other men cherish strong apprehensions 
of the truth, or of what they consider to be truth : they would 
not resign it but with their lives, and would have all men 
to believe as they themselves believe ; thinking that their 
doctrine and their church is founded on the primitive custom 
and creed, and not to be set aside by every new-fangledness, 
and extemporal lightness, or conceit of their more changeable 
fellow-creatures. Now when these men stand fast to their 
own views and principles, setting an exceeding intrinsical 
value on them, and yet give full liberty to others whose later 
novelties they condemn, then toleration, in the virtue of its 
highest principle, is exercised ; and the generosity and kind- 
ness of their Christianity is nobly manifested to the world. 
For toleration is like the virtue of forgiveness of injuries ; the 
deeper the injury the grander the forgiveness. Toleration 
does not imply compliance or compromise, but the temper 
with which we bear other persons' views and dispositions. 
So saith the pious Hannah More, " Oh, how I hate faction, 
division, and controversy in religion ! And yet if people will 
advance dangerous absurdities till they become popular, truth 
must not be left to shift for herself" But of the alienation 
of heart among Chi'istian people, perhaps John Newton ^f 
speaks best. He wants to know, how it is that members of 

* See the Appendix to the Life of Lord Orrery, by Eustace Budgell, 
Esq. 2d. edit 1734. 

t Letter to Hannah More, vol. iii. p. 19, of her Memoirs. 
L 



242 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

the same body, partakers of the same grace, are often so shy 
and suspicious of one another : so inconsistent with them- 
selves and their principles ? And he gives as a reason, the 
painful fact, that they are still encumbered with a remnant 
of pride, prejudice, and self-will. Satan has a magic glass, 
and there are certain magical words, most of which oM^e 
their influence, if not their origin to him. The believer, 
when he looks at a brother Christian, as he would hope he 
is, "sees a Calvinist, or an Arminian, a High Churchman, 
a Sectary, a Methodist, &c. One of these names, perhaps, 
he prides himself in avowing, and therefore allows that those 
who bear it must be infallibly right : the others he dislikes, 
and therefore takes it for granted that those who bear them 
must be wrong : and though he would hope the best, he is 
not desirous of actual communion with such perverse, mis- 
taken people. And yet, perhaps, some of them are much 
more spiritual, humble, and exemplary than himself But 
he sees them through the medium of party prejudice," &c. 

The above is too true a picture of the religious world, by 
one who knew it well. True toleration would at once dissi- 
pate all this kind of narrow, denorainatfonal feeling. Let 
not the word and name of toleration be despised, especially 
by those who can not rise to its smallest exercise. Happy 
the time when toleration is swallowed up in union I Mean- 
while, since differing creeds and parties must yet be presented 
before the eyes of the inhabitants of the world, 

" Let them see, 
That as more pure and gentle is your faith, 
Yourselves are gentler, purer." * 



* Robert Southey. 



CHAPTER XV. 

MORE OPINIONS ON, AND TREATMENT OF DISSENTERS. 

It will be perceived that the desire of toleration just 
offered exceeds that of Dr. Johnson ; and yet while he could 
not tolerate certain doctrines, forms of church government, 
and modes of proceedings among dissenters, he ever tolerated 
their persons, so long as ignorance or moral misbehavior did 
not drive him him to refuse companionship. 

One anecdote will especially show us Dr. Johnson's pre- 
dominant feeling in regard to the Church of England, namely, 
of its superiority. Dr. Robertson, the historian, who was 
very companionable, once said, " Dr. Johnson, allow me to 
say that in one respect I have the advantage of you : when 
you were in Scotland you would not come to hear any of 
our preachers, whereas, when I am here I attend your public 
worship without scruple, and indeed with great satisfaction." 
Johnson answered, " Why sir, that is not so extraordinary : 
the king of Siam sent embassadors to Louis the Fourteenth, 
but Louis the Fourteenth sent none to the king of Siam," 
There is an historical mistake here, but we can not mistake 
Johnson's meaning. However, he liked to converse with 
Robertson, though he could not suffer his religious views. 

Boswell had hired a servant in London who was a Roman 
Catholic. He asked Johnson whether this should prevent 
his taking him to Scotland. "Why, no, sir," replied John- 
son, " if he has no objection, you can have none." This led 
to a brief conversation, in M"hich he expressed his dislike of 
the Presbyterian religion ; and on Boswell asking his reason, 
he said, " Why, sir, the Presbyterians have no church, no 
apostolical ordination." " And do you think that absolutely 
essential, sir?" asked Boswell. "Why, sir," answered 
Johnson, "as it was an apostolical institution, I think it is 



244 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

dangerous to be without it. And, sir, the Presbyterians 
have no pubUc worship : they have no form of prayer in 
which they know they are to join. They go to hear a man 
pray, and are to judge whether they will join with him." 
What pith and marrow in this observation I 

We may be surprised that Boswell did not stand up more 
for his views. The Presbyterians, of course, think they have 
a church, and apostolical ordination.* Johnson would have 
taken up a stronger position on their want of succession. 
The one, however, is involved in the other, and he would 
soon have come to it. Certainly he states a strong reason, 
in these days of many opinions, against extemporaneous 
prayer in a public congregation. To him this must have 
been insurmountable. Let us only imagine his awful manner 
of composing himself for prayer : his love for devoutness, and 
for holy and reverent expressions, without passion and with- 
out exaggeration : feeling himself in the very presence of the 
Jehovah, with that Jehovah's eye upon his heart ; fearful, 
before all things, lest a flippant or presumptuous word escape 
his lips : just see him on his knees with his awful counte- 
nance and humbled heart, and then consider with what 
horror he would hear the fluent and familiar language which 
too often pervades prayer — prayer which should ever be most 
chastened, most solemn in its every word. To any man the 
confusion must be great, when he prepares himself for prayer 
and can not join in the petitions ; and yet how often must 

* The Presbyterians and Congregationalists have yet to go to Scrip- 
ture, and examine it carefully, in regard to matters ol' church formation 
and discipline. Dr. Wardlaw takes one view, and Dr. Davidson an- 
other. The latter, however, seems to think that the precedents and 
precepts of apostolic men are not binding on future times ; that churches 
in the present day "may make tieiv i-cgulations, and change apostolic 
practices''' (p. 24) ; and the former denies that the decree of the Coun- 
cil at Jerusalem was inspired ! Dr. Campbell, in Lectures on Ecclesi- 
astical History, Lect. 4, p. 81, says, "In regard to those politics 
which obtain at present in thediflerent Christian sects, I own ingenuousl}', 
that I have not found one, of all that I have examined, which can be 
said perfectly to coincide with the model of the apostolic church^ See 
an able article in the British Quarterly Review for May, 1848. Also 
a review of the Duke of Argyle's work, "Presbytery Examined."' in 
the North British Review, No. 20. p. 445, &c. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 245 

this be the case with the better-informed and more devout 
minds I Hence we find that the meetings of the British and 
Foreign Bible Society are rarely opened with prayer : and 
though persons meet to circulate that Book which commands 
prayer, yet they can not practice its injunctions for fear of 
offending one another. The Bible authority for the use of 
a liturgy is great ; and certainly there is this advantage, that 
we know beforehand what we shall pray for, and it is open 
to us either to comply or to keep away. 

Boswell attempted to propitiate Johnson by saying, " But, 
sir, their doctrine is the same with that of the Church of En- 
gland. Their Confession of Faith, and the Thirty-nine Ar- 
ticles, contain the same points, even the doctrine of predesti- 
nation." "Why, yes, sir," said Johnson, "predestination 
was a part of the clamor of the times, so it is mentioned in 
our articles, but with as little positiveness as could be." It 
makes a difference, certainly, whether decided prominence be 
given to a doctrine, or whether it be barely admitted : but 
we must recollect that there are two kinds of predestination, 
absolute and conditional, contended for, and the Church of 
England would only support the latter ; and her positiveness, 
not little, for her article is a grand one, would lie all on that 
side. Boswell should have thought, that when dissenters 
speak of their slight differences, and plead for sameness with 
the church in all essentials, it may very properly be asked 
them. Why they dissent at all ? why break through the 
bonds of fellowship, and cover the earth with divisions, when 
they acknowledge that the causes are unessential ? Strictly 
speaking, we should not, perhaps, call the members of the 
Scotch Kirk, dissenters. They never separated from us : 
they, as a National Church, are independent of us, though 
schismatics as regards the Church Catholic. 

Dr. Johnson's plain straightforward manner in talking 
with Boswell and other Presbyterians, may put us in some 
degree in mind of Lord Thurlow's way. A body of Presby- 
terians once made an application to his lordship to assist in 
repealing certain statutes which disqualified them from hold- 
ing civil offices. He received the deputation with great 
civility, but, in his own bluiat manner, replied, " Why, gentle- 



246 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

men, if your old, sour religion had been the Establishment, I 
might have complied : but as it is not, you can not expect 
me to accede to your request." They retired smihng, says 
Lord Campbell ;* and probably less dissatisfied than if he had 
tried to reason them into a conviction of the justice of the 
Test and Corporation Acts. They knew the manner of this 
powerful judge, and respected its sincereness. 

Boswell must have been inclined in great degree to the 
Church of England. Johnson said to him, " Sir, the holy 
days observed by our church are of great use in religion." 
And the Presbyterian allows that there can be no doubt of this, 
if the number be not too extensive. He recommends Nelson's 
" Festivals and Fasts," as a most valuable help to devotion, 
and states that it has met with the greatest sale of any book 
ever printed in England, except the Bible : also he highly 
commends two sermons on this subject by Archdeacon Pott. 
And then he expresses himself in this remarkable way : "I 
am sorry to have it to say, that Scotland is the only Christian 
country, Catholic or Protestant, where the great events of our 
religion are not solemnly commemorated by its ecclesiastical 
Establishment, on days set apart for the purpose." 

We have now got well rid of the Roman Catholic calen- 
dar of saints' days ; we care neither for the ordinance of 
Bishop Niger, or the provincial constitution of Archbishop Islip ; 
the bulls of Popes have passed away, and we of the Church 
of England, only keep days in celebration of the saints of the 
New Testament, and festivals in honor of great facts connected 
with our Lord's sojourn and ministry on the earth. These 
are all days of useful instruction, and the antiquity of this 
sacred custom commends it. It ought to be esteemed a high 
privilege to steal away from the cares and business of life, 
and from the boisterous ones of the world, to hear, from the 
Scripture and from discourses on the lives of the saints, in 
the sanctuary, of those who have already chanted forth, in 
triumphal strain, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, 
where is thy victory ?" Surely much spiritual knowledge 
and refreshment may be thus gained, and the little knot of 
persons who may assemble in parish churches on the week 
* Lives of the Lord Chancellors, vol. v. p. 662. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 247 

day seem best to be those " who going through the vale of 
misery use it for a well."* 

Not only had the Presbyterian church of Scotland, in Dr. 
Johnson's opinion, no apostolic ordination, liturgy, and, as 
Boswell says, no observance of holy days, but the doctor in- 
sisted also that there were no theological works of merit 
written by any of its ministers ; and his remark was not 
satisfactorily contradicted. 

Nothing could induce him to enter a Presbyterian church. 
He could dine with the minister and be very friendly : he 
would even call the new road to the church which Boswell's 
father had made, by the name of the Via Sacra, but he 
would not enter its sacred portals. Boswell gives this note 
of Nov. 7, 1773 : " My father and I went to public worship 
in our parish church, in which I regretted that Dr. Johnson 
would not join us : for though we have there no form of 
prayer, nor magnificent solemnity, yet, as God is worshiped 
in spirit and in truth, and the same doctrine is preached as 
in the Church of JElngland, my friend would certainly have 
shown more liberality, had he attended. I doubt not, how- 
ever, but he employed his time in private to very good pur- 
pose. His uniibrm and fervent piety was manifested on 
many occasions during our tour, which I have not mention- 
ed." 

Before this, he had refused to go and hear Principal 
Robertson preach. We have his reason : "I will hear him," 
said he, " if he will get up into a tree and preach ; but I 
will not give a sanction, by my presence, to a Presbyterian 
assembly." 

He was staying at a Presbyterian's house, where it was 
thought he might not like to join in family prayer. The 
host would have omitted prayer altogether, but on his scru- 
pulosity being mentioned to Johnson, the latter said he had 
no objection to hear the prayer. Mr. Grant having prayed, 
Dr. Johnson said his prayer was a very good one, but objected 
to his not having introduced the Lord's Prayer. Johnson 
says, in his Journerj, of this omission generally : " The most 
learned of the Scottish doctors would now gladly admit a 
* Psalm Ixxxiv. 6. 



218 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

form of prayer, if the people would endure it. The zeal 
or rage of congregations has its different degrees. In 
some parishes the Lord's Prayer is suffe7-ed I in others 
it is still rejected as a form, and he that should make it 
part of his supplication, would be suspected of heretical 
pravity I" 

How different is this custom to that of the Church of 
England I for she will have no Service of Prayers without 
including the Lord's Prayer ; and hence, since three Ser- 
vices have been thrown into one, this holy prayer may seem 
to occur too often : and yet, which of the Services could we 
deprive of it ? 

Why the Presbyterians of Scotland should often entirely 
reject its use, is extraordinary. For in their own Directory 
for worship it is not only recommended as a pattern for prayer, 
but allowed to he used as a form. And the same assembly 
of divines who made that Directory, in their annotations 
upon the Lord's Prayer, say the same ; so that from the 
avowed principles of the Presbyterians, the Lord's Prayer 
may be used in their prayers. 

And as regards the use of forms of prayer, it is clear that 
such were used by the Jews, and by the Christians, botir 
before and after immediate inspiration ceased. In the Book 
of Deuteronomy, there is a set form of blessing, of confession, 
and of prayer. Moses prayed by a form (Numb. x. 35); 
and David's Psalms are so many stated forms of prayers and 
praises by alternate response of priest and people, much in 
our own liturgical form. Our Lord frequented the Jewish 
worship, and he sanctioned a form of prayer. During the 
first five centuries of the Christian church, we find several 
Liturgies composed. 

Not only our own Pweformers retained and loved a Liturgy, 
but the foreign Reformers also countenanced such a form. 
Thus Luther made a Liturgy for tiie Chvirch of Wittenberg ; 
and all the Lutheran churches have a stated, prescribed form, 
which they constantly use. 

Calvin composed a Liturgy, which was used in Geneva, 
and (where they could do it) in France; and that he ap- 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 219 

proved of Liturgies is plain from a letter he wrote to the 
Protector of England. * 

But what is most to the purpose, John Knox also com- 
posed a Liturgy. He, who " dreaded one mass more than 
ten thousand armed men ;" he, Avhose intellect and flow of 
language, we may suppose, never failed him ; he still thought 
the use of a Liturgy advisable ; and more than one eminent 
divine of the Scottish church, in this day, have expressed 
earnest desire for a liturgical form of prayer ; and certainly 
a greater earnest of union and stability can hardly be con- 
ceived. We may reasonably say, that it is the Liturgy of 
the Church of England, far more than her articles, or canons, 
or homilies, all put together, that has kept her so united, 
and so strong. Besides this, when we consider what the 
extemporaneous effusions of many men must be, it is an 
awful thing to call the Holy Ghost the patron of ail their 
diverse prayers : while a prayer well considered, often Writ- 
ten, often corrected, beneath the sought aid of the Holy 
Spirit, is more likely to be in accordance with the word and 
will of God. Strange that men who suppose the Holy 
Spirit to direct all their prayers, should never depend on the 
Holy Spirit for a psalm or a hymn, or for an extemporane- 
ous tune, but in this case always seek what is written, and 
trust to the efforts of learning and memory. Surely, a little 
consideration on this fact, and its legitimate inference, ought 
to open their eyes, and bid them know that there are such 
qualities largely inherent in the human mind as self-delusion 
and self-presumption. 

Dr. Johnson felt strongly on the subjects of religion and 
the church, and, as we have said before, we must make al- 
lowance for exclusive adhesion to what a man so firmly be- 
lieves to be the truth, and regard any sentiments of toleration 
in such a one to be of far more value than if proceeding 
from the minds of the careless and the indifferent. He must 
have looked upon the Scottish Presbyterian church as one 

begotten and cradled in murder and blood, not, like his own,' 

. . . I 

reared on the deaths of its own martyrs ; to him it must 

have been politically abhorrent, not only as so inveterate 
* See Calvin, Ep. 87, ad Protect. Angl. 



250 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

against the Stuart race, but as, by its democratic form of 
ecclesiastical institutions, countenancing a like form of civil 
government ; and religiously he must have disliked it, because 
he would think there could not be the spirit of devoutness, 
and the form of sound words, either in desk or pulpit, to 
which he would have been accustomed in the English 
church ; and never, as we may see, did he go into the pres- 
ence-chamber without due feelings of reverence and devotion. 
We may be very certain that no spirit of mean pride, or 
rivalry, or paltry exclusiveness actuated him, but that he 
refused because his conscience told him it was simply, yet 
sternly, his duty to do so. 

With more cordiality we can support him in refusing to 
go to a kind of religious Robin-Hood Society in London, to 
hear a discussion by lawyers' clerks, petty tradesmen, and 
low mechanics, on the mysterious text of Matt, xxvii. 52, 
53. Mrs. Hall said, it was a very curious subject, and she 
should like to hear it discussed. Johnson replied, warmly, 
" One would not go to such a place to hear it ; one would 
not be seen in such a place, to give countenance to such a 
meeting." " But, sir," said she, with all the eager curiosity 
of a woman, " I should like to hear tjoic discuss it." But 
he seemed reluctant to engage in it. This was the rever- 
ential feature of his character. But great men do not flip- 
pantly talk on all subjects, on all occasions, at all times. It 
was once said. We see such men as the late Earl of Orrery, 
the late Earl of Shaftesbury, the late Mr. Addison, Mr. 

Prior, and Mr. Mainwaring sit silent, while , and , 

and , and , hold forth upon every subject that 

falls under debate. 

We may be more confirmed in our belief, that Dr. John- 
son most conscientiously abstained from entering a Presby- 
terian church* (and recollect, the pious Hannah More, 
though much tempted, never entered a dissenting chapel in 
the whole course of her life),t when we view his conduct 
toward Presbyterian ministers individually. Boswell says : 

* He also never entered a non-juring meeting-house, though his 
feelings were with the non-jurors, 
t Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 125. 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 251 

" Dr. Johnson, though he held notions far distant from those 
of the Presbyterian clergy, yet could associate on good terms 
with them. He indeed occasionally attacked them. One 
of them discovered a narrowness of information concerning 
the dignitaries of the Church of England, among whom may 
be found men of the greatest learning, virtue, and piety, and 
of a truly apostolic character. He talked before Dr. John- 
son of fat bishops and drowsy deans, and, in short, seemed to 
believe the illiberal and profane scoffings of pi'ofessed satirists 
or vulgar railers. Dr. Johnson was so highly offended, that 
he said to him, ' Sir, you know no more of our church than 
a Hottentot.'" Bos well adds, "I was sorry that he brought 
this upon himself" 

The question was once started, how far people who dis- 
agree in a capital point can live in friendship together. 
Johnson said they might, while Goldsmith held they could 
not. The former cited the instance of himself and Burke, 
stating that the subject on which persons disagree must be 
shunned. " I can live very well with Burke," he said ; " I 
love his knowledge, his genius, his diffusion and affluence of 
conversation ; but I would not talk to him of the Rocking- 
ham party." Goldsmith insisted that the shunned subject 
would be the very one that people would have the greatest 
eagerness and curiosity to enter upon ; as when Bluebeard 
says, " You may look into all the chambers but one," we 
should have the greatest inclination to look into that cham- 
ber. " Sir," replied Johnson, loudly, " I am not saying that 
you could live in friendship with a man from whom you dif- 
fer as to some point ; I am only saying that I could do it." 

Yes, he could do it ; though if the adverse opinion were 
urged, he could be angry with the man. " Every man," he 
said at another time, " who attacks my belief" in Christian- 
ity, " diminishes in some degree my confidence in it, and 
therefore makes me uneasy ; and I am angry with him who 
makes me uneasy." And again : " Every man will dispute 
with great good humor upon a subject in which he is not in- 
terested." And so Gallio cared for none of these things; the 
disputes about a religion in which he did not himself believe 
were of no concern to him ; and such was the Roman's pol- 



252 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

icy under the circumstances. But with Johnson, even in 
these Presbyterian cases, a certain degree of sacrifice was to 
be made. 

In another place, we are told, " Though Johnson loved a 
Presbyterian the least of all, this did not prevent his having 
a long and uninterrupted connection with the Rev. Dr. James 
Fordyce, who, since his death, hath gratefully celebrated him 
in a warm strain of devotional composition." 

The celebrated Dr. Blair, whose sermons are so well known 
for their stern moral sentiments, was introduced to him by 
Dr. Fordyce. Of him he once said, " I read yesterday Dr. 
Blair's sermon on devotion, from the text, ' Cornelius, a de- 
vout man.' His doctrine is the best limited, the best ex- 
pressed ; there is the most warmth without fanaticism, the 
most rational transport. There is one part of it which I 
disapprove, and I'd have him correct it ; which is, ' that he 
who does not feel joy in religion is far from the kingdom of 
heaven !' There are many good men whose fear of God pre- 
dominates over their love. It may discourage. It was 
rashly said. A noble sermon it is indeed. I toisli Blair 
would come over to the Church of England'^ 

A good wish this, and proving the sincerity of his love for 
the Church of England ; for all who really love her will ever 
desire to see all excellence thriving within her pale, all that 
is corrupt and sluggish cast out. Dr. Johnson's remark about 
fear predominating over love in many minds, is good, because, 
though we are told that " perfect love casteth out fear," there 
is an allusion here only to slavish fear, a terror of God, rather 
than that proper and reverential fear which an Apostle com- 
mands, and which is to be cherished to the end of our lives. 
We are not required to feel the same kind of familiar loVe 
toward God which we entertain toward human friends ; and 
Croker well observes, in a short comment on this passage in 
Blair's sermon, that " the love of God and the love of one's 
wife or friend are certainly not the same passion." Lucas 
states, in a more grave manner, although Croker's remark is 
just, that our love of God is not merely an honorable opinion 
of him, but a passion or affection : " the Scripture," he says, 
" expresses this love by delight and joy, by desire and long- 



OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS 2:.3 

ing, hungering, thirsting, seeking, and the like. If we love 
God above all things, our hearts vi'ill be where our treasure 
is ; our afiections will be fastened on things above ; and our 
conversation will be in heaven, because our God is there :" 
yet, in order to prevent persons from being too much cast 
down because they lack a high degree of ardor, he continues : 
" God is a being infinitely above our conceptions, and that of 
him which we do conceive, as power, wisdom, and goodness, 
though amiable, yet are spiritual, and not the objects of sense, 
and therefore do not move us with the same violence that 
sensible things do ; whence it is easy to conclude, that our 
love of God is of a different nature from that we pay the 
creature ; 'tis a more spiritual afiection mixed with adoration ; 
'tis an awful desire of pleasing and enjoying him, not always 
terminating in so vehement and sensible a passion as visible 
objects beget in us ; and therefore the safest way is to judge 
of our state, not by tratisjjorts, but by the firtnness of our 
resolutions, and by the constancy and cheerfulness of our 
obedience."^ The italics are his own marks of the stress he 
desired to place upon these words. Sir "Walter Scott sadly 
confounds the different meanings which may be given to the 
same term, when he commences some beautiful lines with the 
words, 

" In peace love tunes the shepherd's reed," &c. 

and gives this conclusion, 

" For love is heaven, and heaven is love." 

Blair's sermons are not read in the present generation so 
much as their value entitles them to be. There are two 
very expressive ones, on the texts, "All this availeth me 
nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the 
king's gate ;" and, " Thine own friend, and thy father's friend, 
forsake not." 

Abernethy and Gibbons were dissenting divines whose works 
Dr. Johnson perused. Of the latter, he says, " I took to Dr. 
Gibbons," And again, he said to Mr. Charles Dilly, " I shall 
be glad to see him. Tell him, if he'd call on me, and dawdle 
over a dish of tea in an afternoon, I shall take it kind." Of 
* Lucas's Practical Christianity, chap. v. p. 88, 89. 



254 OPINIONS ON DISSENT AND DISSENTERS. 

Baxter and many other of the elder non-conformists we know 
that he thought highly, but approving of their piety when 
grave, more than admiring their learning ; lor in his mind 
the bishops and clergy were most profound in knowledge, 
scriptural, or classical ; and certainly it would have been a 
shame to them if they did not excel, for they have more ma- 
terials within their reach, and deeper sources from which to 
inform and embellish their minds, than the many who are 
not united with the universities and public libraries can pos- 
sibly have. His distinction of the difierent degrees of attain- 
ment of learning was thus marked upon two occasions. Of 
Queen Elizabeth he said, " She had learning enough to have 
given dignity to a bishop ;" and of Mr. Thomas Davies he 
said, " Sir, Davies has learning enough to give credit to a 
clergyman." 

Whitfield, when in Scotland, notes that one of the minis- 
ters of the Associate Presbytery preached upon the text, 
" Watchman, what of the night ?" &c. " T attended," says 
Whitfield ; " but the good man so spent himself, in the former 
part of his sermon, in talking against prelacy, the Common 
Prayer-book, the surplice, the rose in the hat, and such like 
externals, that when he came to the latter part of his text, 
to invite poor sinners to Jesus Christ, his breath was so gone, 
that he could scarce be heard."* 

To one of his correspondents at this time, Whitfield replied, 
" I wish you would not trouble yourself or me in writing 
about the corruption of the Church of England. I believe 
there is no church perfect under heaven ; but as God, by 
His providence, is pleased to send me forth simply to preach 
the Gospel to all, I think there is no need of casting myself 
out." 

* Southey's Life of Wesley, vol. ii. p. 230. 



CHAPTER XVI. 
THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

Dr.. Johnson evidently liked what he saw during scant 
opportunities of John Wesley. He said, " John Wesley's con- 
versation is good, but he is never at leisure. He is always 
obliged to go at a certain hour. This is very disagreeable to 
a man who loves to fold his legs and have out his talk, as I 
do." Again he said, " He can talk well on any subject ;" 
but thought he did not believe the ghost story on sufficient 
authority, and lamented that Wesley did not take more pains 
to inquire into the evidence for it. Johnson afterward gave 
Boswell a note of introduction to Wesley, " because" he says 
in the note itself, " I think it very much to be wished that 
worthy and religious men should be acquainted with each 
other." Boswell had thus an opportunity of conferring with 
Wesley on the matter of the appearance of the ghost at New- 
castle-upon-Tyne, but the evidence did not satisfy him, although 
Wesley believed it. 

Few men have had more accusers than Wesley, and few 
men engaged warmer friends. Let us pass by the abuse, 
and receive the character given of him by a high churchman, 
and his familiar friend. " My whole soul," says Alexander 
Knox, Wesley's " dear Allick," " rises against those vile al- 
legations of ambition and vanity : above both of which my 
precious old friend soared, as much as the eagle above the 
glow-worm. Great minds are not vain ; and his was a great 
mind, if any mind can be made great, by disinterested be- 
nevolence, spotless purity, and simple devotedness to that one 
Supreme Good, in whom with the united aladrjaig of the 
philosopher and the saint, he saw, and loved, and adored, all 
that was infinitely amiable, true, subUme, and beatific."* 

* How different is this to the ultra-evangelical's view of Wesley ! 
Romaine, in a letter to Lady Huntingdon, says : " I pity Mr. John from 
ray heart. His societies are in great confusion ; and the point which 



256 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

Again he writes, " In John Wesley's views of Christian 
perfection are combined, in substance, all the sublime moral- 
ity of the Greek Fathers, the spirituality of the mystics, and 
the divine philosophy of our favorite Platonists. Macarius, Fc- 
nelon, Lucas and all their respectivec lasses, have been consult- 
ed and digested by him ; and his ideas are, essentially, theirs ;" 
and he especially praises him for having popularized these 
sublime lessons in his hymns. 

But this was the doctrine which called up so many relig- 
ious enemies against him. Knox, on reading the Life of 
Hey, says, " I then saw in a light which never before struck 
me, that the real motive with John Wesley was, the dread 
of Calvinist infection, then beginning to grow rife in churches. 
Before this consideration, with him every thing but moral 
evil fell flat." Here we have the clew to the raging contro- 
versies of 1772 and 1773, in which Toplady and Fletcher, 
Rowland Hill and others were so excitingly engaged. On 
the Calvinistic side appeared, " Farrago double distilled ;" 
" An old Fox tarred and feathered ;" " Pope John," &;c. ; 
" More work for John Wesley :" while on the Wesleyan part 
the title of " Devil- factors" was given to the Calvinists ; 
" Satan's synagogue;" " Advocates for sin ;" " Witnesses for 
the father of lies;" "Blasphemers;" "Satan-sent preachers;" 
«' Devils, liars, fiends." Wesley himself thus summed up 
the doctrine of Mr. Toplady's pamphlet on Predestination : 
" The sum of this ; one in twenty (suppose) of mankind are 
elected ; nineteen in twenty are reprobated. The elect shall 
be saved, do what they will ; the reprobate shall be damned, 
do what they can. Reader, believe this or be damned." 
With this view of Calvinism, Wesley might truly be horri- 
fied ; but this, though it might become the legitimate fruit 
of the Lambeth Articles, is not the doctrine of Calvin 
himself No man has suffered more from the misrepre- 

brouorht them into the wildness of rant and madness is still insisted on 
as much as ever. I fear the end of this delusion. As the late alarm- 
ing Providence has not had its proper effect, and perfection is still the 
cry, God will certainly give them up to some more dreadful thing. 
May their eyes be opened before it be too late !'' Wesley himself com- 
plained of the bitter opposition of such men as Whitfield, Madan, Haw- 
els, Berridge, &c. — Lady Huntingdon^ Memoirs, vol. i. p. 329. 



THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 257 

sentations of friends and followers than Calvin ; and Wesley 
himself has been frequently placed in the same predicament. 

This acrimonious controversy, discreditable to both parties, 
was suspended during a portion of the two following years, 
on account of the interest taken in the dispute between Great 
Britain and her colonies ; both Wesley and Fletcher, with 
many other religious persons, being induced to write on polit- 
ical matters. Fletcher wrote so well, that it is reported, the 
Lord Chancellor desired to know if he wished any preferment 
in the church : and, as to Wesley, it was alleged that he 
wished to be made a bishop. But his " Calm Address to 
our American Colonies," though ineffectual, is as reasoning a 
production as it is deeply loyal. The only strange thing is 
to find such arguments proceeding from Wesley : not but 
that he was always loyal to the backbone ; but it agrees not 
with his ecclesiastical doings. Jn the first paragraph put 
the word " Church" for " Charter," and apply it to " Meth- 
odists" instead of "Americans," and it will be seen what we 
mean. Again, " No province can confer provincial privileges 
on itself;" and " A corporation can no more assume to itself 
privileges which it had not before, than a man can, by his 
own act and deed, assume titles or dignities." Yet Wesley, 
when he pleased, could make a bishop, or desire to get him- 
self made one, without lawful imposition of hands ; thus 
acting for himself, and his own assumption of power, while 
he is blaming the Americans for not being completely obedi- 
ent to the higher authority. " No governments under heaven," 
he says, " are so despotic as the Republican." Again, "Re- 
publics show no mercy ;" and he concludes, " Let us put 
away our sins, the real ground of all our calamities : tvhich 
never will or can be thoroughly removed, till we fear God 
and honor the king." 

Dr. Johnson, in writing a brief note to Wesley, took occa- 
sion to thank him for his America.n views. " I have thanks," 
he says, " likewise to return you for the addition of your im- 
portant suffrage to my argument on the American question. 
To have gained such a mind as yours may justly confirm me in 
my own opinion." " In this little pamphlet," says Southey,* 
* Life of Wesley, vol. ii. p. 421. 



258 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

"he pursued the same chain of reasoning as Dr. Johnson had 
done, and maintained that the supreme power in England 
had a legal right of laying any tax upon them, for any end 
beneficial to the whole empire." Forty thousand copies of 
this " Calm Address" were printed in three weeks. A friend 
to the Methodists obtained possession of all the copies sent to 
New York, and destroyed them, foreseeing the imminent dan- 
ger to which the preachers would be exposed, if a pamphlet 
so unpopular in its doctrines should get abroad. Boswell 
finds fault with Wesley for the course he took ; and when 
Dr. Johnson had said, " Whitfield had a mixture of politics 
and ostentation, whereas Wesley thought of religion only ;" 
he observes in a note, " That can not be said now, after the 
flagrant part which Mr. John Wesley took against our 
American brethren, when, in his own name, he threw among 
his enthusiastic flock the very individual combustibles of Dr. 
Johnson's ' Taxation no Tyranny ;' and after the intolerant 
spirit which he manifested against our fellow Christians of 
the Roman Catholic communion, for which that able cham- 
pion. Father O'Leary, has given him so hearty a drubbing." 
The American question was one out of l^L•o political matters 
only, on which Boswell differed from Johnson. Dr. Towers, 
a Unitarian minister, was a chief opponent of the doctor's 
views ; while Mr. Orme, the able and eloquent historian of 
Hindostan, said : " Had I been George the Third, and thought 
as he did about America, I would have given Johnson three 
hundred a year for his ' Taxation no Tyranny,' alone." 
George the Third, always friendly to Wesley, must have 
been as glad, but in a more honest manner, of his alliance 
on this serious occasion, as King James was of the time-serv- 
ing countenance of William Penn the Quaker ; for both held 
sway over an inflammable portion of the people. 

But while we allow a high personal character to Wesley, 
we can not give our approval to every item of his public 
career and conduct. Knox* could not do so, neither could 

* Wilberforce writes to Mr. Stephen : " Alexander Knox is a man 
of great piety, uncoramon reading (uncommon both in quality and 
quantity), and extraordinary liveliness of imagination and powers of 
conversation. He is really well worth your going ovei on purpose in 



THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 259 

Johnson. The former truly loved him, and held him up as 
an instance, " how happily the most finished courtesy may be 
blended with the most perfect piety." And of his followers, 
he could write, " I have been much with Methodists these 
eight days past. There are most excellent persons among 
them : and, I will add, tlte truest churchmen in the world." 
He states, however, that the majority of preachers have been 
bred dissenters, and are still too much so at heart ; " but a 
good cause," the cause of the church, " is itself a counterpoise 
to number ;" so he hopes the well-disposed part will carry 
it above the other. At a farther period, he states that the 
preachers are not losing ground in their adherence to the 
Established Church ; that they attended the Cathedral 
service and sacraments at Armagh, and took back such a 
good account of the archbishop's sermon, that Dr. Coke sat 
down and wrote an apologetic letter to the primate, express- 
ing his regret that his wife's indisposition had prevented his 
attendance, and declaring his attachment, and that of the 
Methodists, to the Establishment. 

Again, after much "pleasant talk" with them, he says: 
" The Methodists, without any outward alteration that any 
one could discover but ourselves, might positively, in my 
judgment, become the most efficient friends of the Established 
Church, simply by being brought to breathe the same spirit 
with itself" 

At another time we find him saying, " I wrote a pretty 
long letter on the question, ' Ought a member of the Church 
of England to forsake the Methodist society, through fear of 
being liable to the guilt of schism ?' I was obliged to say, 
I think not. What new shape the Methodists may be ac- 
quiring, I will not pronounce. But judging by their char- 
acter heretofore, though I must deem them irregular, I can 
not account them schismatical, because they do not yet exhibit 
separate communion. Considering them, therefore, as irreg- 
ular, I would not advise any one to unite himself to their 
society : but not regarding them as schismatical, I would 

talk with him. He was once, strange to say, Lord Castlereagh's 
private secretary. He is the very last man I should have conceived to 
have gravitated to Lord Castlereagh." 



2G0 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

not advise any one, now in it, to forsake it. I mean, 1 
would not do so, in ordinary circumstances, lest, in depriving 
a weak Christian of his go-cart, I might incapacitate him 
for going at all." He fears that symptoms are appearing 
of a new character, to which his reasoning would not apply.*" 
But under any circumstances he thinks it best to defend the 
church rather by proofs of superior excellence, than by ex- 
clusion of privileges ; and fully to maintain her cause, on 
grounds of good sense, without trenching on any feeling of 
charity. "Let the Methodists act as they may," he observes, 
" I should not deem it right to frighten weak women with 
menances of damnation." 

He also says, when expressing friendly relations toward 
them, " I conceive Wesleyan Methodists, not dissenterized, 
are comparatively with all others, our next of kin." And 
yet, with every kind disposition toward them, he could not 
help discerning their inferiority. "No community," he writes, 
" needs more to be kept on safe ground, for they have miser- 
ably bad anchorage. They seem to think none like them- 
selves : whereas no well-meaning religionists can have a worse 
defined theological creed than themselves." He dislikes 
" the animality of Methodism :" and he thinks that though 
they can awaken men to the elementary principles of religion, 
they can not conduct them on to maturity — they can lay the 
foundation, but not build thereon. 

The fact is, that Wesley was a man raised up for a great 

* It should be remembered, that Knox's remarks, as he himself else- 
where states, apply only to Irish Methodists; he knew nothing of En- 
glish Methodism ; and the latter certainly exhibits separate and schis- 
matical communion. Unless this be stated, Knox's real sentiments 
may be misapprehended. Robert Hall, the eminent dissenter, states, 
however, of England, '• Nothing was farther from the views of these 
excellent men (Whitfield and Wesley), than to innovate in the estab- 
lished religion of their country : their whole aim was to recall the 
people to the good old icay, and to imprint the doctrine of the Articles 
and Homilies on the spirits of mcn^ — Hall's Works, vol. ii. p. 294. 
See Correspondence between Knox and Jebb, Letter 58, vol. i. p. 419, 
for an interesting conversation between Knox and a Methodist, on the 
Methodists having no idea what it was to leave first principles. See 
also Jones's Life of Bishop Home, in Jones's Works, p. 145, vol. vi. ; 
Wesley's excuse for making bishops consisting of the fear of the Ana- 
baptists. 



THE VVESLEYAN METHODISTS. 261 

and signally useful purpose ; and that purpose, under God, 
he nobly effected : but it is equally clear that his example 
was not to be a pattern for all times, neither was his system 
to be one of continuance. We can discern this, when we 
regard his own sayings and doings, and notice the schisms 
that have weakened, and are weakening Wesleyan Methodism. 

For instance, when Wesley said " The world is my parish," 
he announced a magnificent career for himself, but not one 
that could be followed, or is followed, by Churchman or 
Wesleyan, afterward, without causing confusion. Wesleyan 
Methodism has its circuits and stations as regularly marked 
out, though not so permanently it may be, as the church 
owns its dioceses and parishes ; and no Wesleyan minister can 
now cry out, any more than a clergyman, that " the world 
is his parish." The saying is obsolete. Although it suited 
Wesley's object, yet each man now is best located in his 
determined district : and what should we think of a farmer 
who left off" the cultivation of his own allotted farm, and 
crying out, " The world is my farm," should set about urging 
and helping every body else ? This is clearly one of the 
exploits of Wesley's career, which is not to be imitated : 
and, most probably, if not most certainly, in these vigorous 
days of the church, and with large populations to be attended 
to, Wesley himself would be the last man to make the excla- 
mation again ; for such places as Leeds, Manchester, Black- 
burn, &;c., would be found by him to be "world" sufficient 
for a display of all his labor and all his zeal. 

Next, in the case of Wesley making bishops, we see not 
only a present absurdity, and a contradiction to his own belief, 
but also an affair which can not be perpetuated. If Wesley 
had a right, a scriptural or ecclesiastical right, to make a 
bishop, then every clergyman of the church of England in 
priest's orders has the same right, and hence every clergyman 
can make a bishop of whomsoever he will. A clergyman in 
London very lately, the deposed Dr. Dillon, did actually make 
himself a bishop : the first instance, as it were, of a man's 
laying hands on his own head. Wesley made Coke a bishop,* 

* The Works of Bishop Sherlock reclaimed Dr. Coke (the Wesleyan) 
from a philosophical kind of infidelity, and he entered into Holy Orders. 



262 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

and yet Coke was equal with Wesley; so why could not Coke 
make bishops in America without being consecrated in solemn 
form, or letters of ordination, by Wesley ? But let us only 
consider, that at once there would be an end of all order and 
decency if each clergyman could make a bishop, or any num- 
ber of clergymen combine to make a bishop, antagonistic to 
the lawful bishop of their diocese. This consideration is 
enough, but we must recollect that there is a wrongness at 
the root of the matter : for the less is blessed of the greater, 
not the greater of the less ; * and Wesley fully allowed that 
the "greater" did exist and wished Dr. Coke to perpetuate 
the threefold order in America. 

Again, what are we to think of his obtaining ordination 
for his preachers from a Greek bishop, Erastus bishop of 
Arcadia m Crete, who, not knowing one word of English, 
periormed the Service in Greek, in a tongue unknown to the 
ordained I He pressed the foreign bishop also to consecrate 
him, Mr. Wesley himself, that he might henceforth ordain 
whomsoever he would. When Wesley was charged with 
this, and also with having violated the oath of supremacy by 
thus acknowledging the power of a foreign prelate in these 
realms, Mr. Olivers, with Wesley's privity, wrote a pam- 
phlet denying the validity of the latter charge, but justifying 
the former on the ground that the inward call of Mr. Wesley 
and his followers being manifest, they naturally desired the out- 
ward call also. Messrs. Jones and Staniforth were ordain- 
ed by this Greek bishop ; but, it is said, he felt unwillingness 
to consecrate Wesley a bishop, because the ceremony required 
the presence of two or three bishops, and these could not be 
pi'ocured. To crown all, the man was considered by many, 
especially by Mr. Toplady, Romaine, Madan, and others, to 
be an impostor ; he tried to introduce himself to Lady Hunt- 
ingdon,! a singular circumstance for an orthodox Eastern 
bishop, but her ladyship suspected that he was not altogether 

He afterward sought to be made a bishop in the Church of England. — 
Southcy''s Life of Wesley, vol. ii. p. 401. 

* See some excellent remarks in the works of Jones of Nayland, vol. 
vi. p. 147, in his Life of Bishop Home. 

t Lady Huntingdon's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 331. 



"'THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 263 

what he appeared or pretended to be. We often find impos- 
tors bold up to a certain point, and then their heart fails 
them ; and thus, in this instance, if this man were an im- 
postor, he would think that while he might ordain inferior or 
obscure men with impunity, the consecration of so celebrated 
a man as Wesley would rouse the bishops themselves to make 
such inquiry of the Patriarch of Constantinople as would at 
once lay open his designs in this country. A strenuous sup- 
porter* of Wesley adduces this fact as an unfortunate in- 
stance of fanaticism, the ordination in an unintelligible tongue, 
and thus an unedifying right ; saying of Wesley, " We 
allow that he was fanatical at times ; but this only amounts 
to the confession that he had some taint of human infirmity 
cleaving to a nature in the main noble, self-possessed, and 
wise." Let us accept the apology ; but let it be acknowledged 
that Wesley's plan is not only not 'perfection, but in no wise 
to be perpetuated. 

Dr. Johnson thought that Sheridan took too much upon 
himself in presenting Home, the author of " Douglas," with 
a gold medal. He said " A medal has no value but as a 
stamp of merit ; and was Sheridan to assume to himself the 
right of giving that stamp ? If Sheridan was munificent 
enough to bestow a gold medal as an honorary reward of 
dramatic excellence, he should have requested one of the 
universities to choose the person on whom it should be con- 
ferred. Sheridan had no right to give a stamp of merit : it 
was counterfeiting AjjoUo's coin." The man who liked not 
assumption in a literary sense, would neither approve of it in 
ecclesiastical performance ; and yet, viutatis nominibu?,, we 
see the coin of the church counterfeited, not only by Wesley, 
but by many others. 

Error must have its beginning. And on the general 
question of the origin of sects, may it not be pertinently asked : 
Whether the y?rs^ person, who, after the lapse of 1500 years, 

* Rev. O. T. Dobbin, in Kitto^s Journal of Sacred Literature, Jan. 7, 
1849. He also states, and so does Alexander Knox, that Wesley too 
often fonned a favorable opinion of those about him ; and the conse- 
quences were annoying, though the cause was rather a virtue. So was 
it with the amiable Bishop Heber. 



2G4 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

ventured to call himself a minister * without having been or- 
dained by a bishop, was really right, and that the whole 
Christian church, western and eastern, was from the days of 
the apostles, and for fifteen centuries after, entirely wrong and 
mistaken as to the real meaning of the words of Scripture 
concerning the Christian ministry ? If the first adventurer 
was wrong, then all his successors, be they five, or fifty, or 
fifty thousand, are wrong also : but if right, then any one has 
Scriptural liberty to form a sect, and the only wonder is that, 
instead of one hundred sects, there are not one hundred thou- 
sand, and that an Elwall, and his Elwallians f do not arise, 

* "During Fleetwood's management, the theatre was in difficulties, 
and bailiffs often in possession. The hat of King Richard the Third, by 
being adorned with jewels of paste, feathers, and other ornaments, seem- 
ed, to the sheriffs' officers, a prey worthy of their seizure ; but honest 
Davy, Mr. Garrick's Welsh servant, told them they did not know what 
they were about. ' For look you,' said Davy, ' that hat belongs to the 
king." The fellows, imagining that what was meant of Richard the 
Third was spoken of Georere the Second, resigned their prey, though 
with some reluctance." — Memoirs of David Garrick^ vol. i. p. 65. 

The above anecdote is called to mind, when the pretensions of dissent- 
ing ministers are thrust forward. There is the counterfeit hat and the 
counterfeit king. Thus we find dissenters calling their sect (however 
insignificant) "the church" — their ministers style themselves "Rever- 
end," take out degrees of D.D., &c, in distant lands, and array them- 
selves in black coat and white neckcloth, thus imitating a bona fide cler- 
gyman of the Established Church. Why they do so ? is a question to 
which an answer has never yet been obtained. Some old Wesleyan 
preachers were much opposed to such assumptions. 7— See Life of Sam- 
uel Drew, p. 519. 

A rare instance of a proud dissenter is given us in the biographical 
and literar)'^ anecdotes of Mr. William Bowyer, in the person of a 
Charles Jennens, Esq. (an eccentric man, whether he had been church- 
man or dissenter), who, from his excess of pomp, acquired the title of 
Solyman the Magnificent. If his transit was only from one street to 
another not far distant, he alwa3^s traveled with four horses and some- 
times as many servants behind his carriage. In his progress up the 
paved court (to Mr. Bowyer's), a footman usually preceded him, to 
kick oyster-shells and other impedients out of his way. His obstinacy 
was equal to his vanity ; for what he had once asserted, though manifest- 
ly false, he would always maintain. He wrote a pamphlet against Dr. 
Johnson, which he caused to be read aloud to himself every day for at 
least a month after its publication, while all the world was laughing at 
it and the writer of it. See p. 442, 443. 

t See Boswell's Life, &c. p. 235. 



THE VVESLEYAN METHODISTS. 265 

like the armed ones of Marmion, out of every bush, on every 
side. Many sects must feel annoyed, when going to the root 
of their genealogical tree, to find it so stunted ; commencing 
not with an apostle certainly, but with a Mr. Brown, or any 
other gentleman who thought it necessary to be violent or 
disorderly in advancing the peaceful kingdom of the Messiah 
— and wittily did Charles Wesley, as reported, reprove his 
own brother : 

" How easily are bishops made 
By man or woman's whim ; 
Wesley his hands on Coke hath laid, 
But who laid hands on him? " 

METHODISTS. 

Dr. Johnson owned that the Methodists had done good ; 
had spread religious impressions among the vulgar part of 
mankind : " but," he said, " they had great bitterness against 
other Christians, and that he never could get a Methodist to 
explain in what he excelled others ; that it always ended in 
the indispensable necessity of hearing one of their preach- 
ers." 

In his life of Cheynell, where this Presbyterian boasts of 
exercising his ministry in a place where there had been little 
of the power of religion known or practiced, he says : " We 
now observe, that the Methodists, where they scatter their 
opinions, represent themselves as preaching the gospel to un- 
converted nations. And enthusiasts of all kinds have been 
inclined to disguise their particular tenets with pompous ap- 
pellations, and to imagine themselves the great instruments 
of salvation ! " It is said, that the shadow of learning is gen- 
erally, like ghosts of deceased persons, the 

"More fiercely bright, and larger than the life," 

more so than shadoiv or ghost can warrant. 

He thought the expulsion of six students from the Univer- 
sity of Oxford, who were Methodists, and would not desist 
from praying and exhorting, was extremely just and proper. 
" What have they to do at an university," he asked " who 
are not willing to be taught, but will presume to teach ? 

M 



266 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

Where is religion to be learnt but at an university ? Sir, 
they were examined, and found to be mighty ignorant fel- 
lows." 

BoswELL. — But, was it not hard, sir, to expel them ; for 
I am told they were good beings ?" 

Johnson. — " I believe they might be good beings, but they 
were not fit to be in the University of Oxford. A cow is a very 
good animal in the field ; but we turn her out of a garden." 
We are told that Lord Elibank used to repeat this as an 
illustration uncommonly happy ; but we must own, we can 
not altogether discern its justness or entire charity. The 
•' good beings" might only teach what they were taught, and 
where then the harm ? For all Christians have liberty to 
exhort, comfort, and rebuke ; and if not fit to do these in the 
university, neither, in Johnson's opinion, should they have 
been fit for such performance in the world. 

The Rev. Dr. Maxwell, some time preacher at the Temple, 
and a friend of Johnson's, says, " He observed, that the es- 
tablished clergy in general did not preach plain enough ; and 
that polished periods and glittering sentences flew over the 
heads of the common people without any impression on their 
hearts. Something might be necessary, he observed, to excite 
the affections of the common people, who were sunk in languor 
and lethargy, and therefore he supposed that the new con- 
comitants of Methodism might probably produce so desirable 
an effect." 

On another occasion, fourteen years after, speaking of the 
religious discipline proper for unhappy convicts, he said, " Sir, 
one of our regular clergy will probably not impress their minds 
sufficiently ; they should be attended by a Methodist preacher, 
or a Popish priest." It appeared, however, that the exertions 
of the chaplain of Newgate, the Rev. Mr. Vilette, had been 
very successful during a period of eighteen years. 

He would not allow much merit to Whitfield's oratory. 
"His popularity, sir," said he, -'is chiefly owing to the pecu- 
liarity of his manner. He would be followed by crowds were 
he to wear a night-cap in the pulpit, or were he to preach 
from a tree." He was at the same college with Johnson, 
who knew him, as he once said, smiling, " before he began 



THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 267 

to be better than other people ; " yet he believed he sincerely 
meant well. 

What effect would either Wesley or Whitfield, in their 
oratory, have made on Parliament ? The calm good sense 
of the former would probably have told more than the fine 
glowing eloquence of the latter. Richard Sharp * says, 
" That the Methodist preacher would produce no other effect 
in Parliament but that of making himself ridiculous, is un- 
questionable ; " and he goes on to prove that he would be in- 
eloquent there, because he would not have a constant regard 
to the quality of his audience, and thus would violate a prime 
rule of rhetoric. He quotes Dr. Browne,! as saying, "The 
pathetic orator, who throws a congregation of enthusiasts into 
tears and groans, would raise affections of a very different 
nature, should he attempt to proselyte an English Parliament : " 
and Dr. Leland,t "The orator who throws a congregation of 
enthusiasts into tears and groans, is in reality, no orator at all ; 
because he owes his influence, not to clearness and strength 
of reasoning, not to dignity of sentiment, force, or elegance of 
expression, and the like, but to senseless exclamation, unmean- 
ing rhapsody ; or to grimace, to a sigh, to a rueful counte- 
nance : and if he would in vain endeavor to proselyte an 
English Parliament, it is for this very reason, because he is 
no orator ; nor can any man without any of the apposita, 
the rational excellences and enjoying qualities of speech, be 
said to possess a degree of eloquence perfect in its kind." 

The grimace and groans of the tabernacle have much 
ceased now among Wesleyan Methodists, and will cease 
more and more in proportion as the gravity and soundnes? 
of preachers, educated at the Theological college prevail. 
The Primitive Methodists, or Ranters, will for a while keep 
up these things among the ignorant and excitable people 
who love the marvelous, at the same time that it alarms 
them ; for there is a kind of pleasure in this indulgence, and 
persons who can be made to cry dreadfully, will, in the 

* Letters and Essays, 2d edit. p. 127. 1834. 
t Essay on Ridicule. 

$ Leland's Dissertation on the Principles of Human Eloquence, chap, 
xiv. 



268 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

course of nature, soon experience the re-acting sense of for- 
giveness. Such is self-delusion, that the pleasure here is 
greater in being cheated, than to cheat. 

Boswell told him that he had been at a meeting of the 
people called Quakers, where he had heard a woman preach. 
Johnson replied, " Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog 
walking on his hind legs — it is not done well, but you are 
surprised to find it done at all." 

And not only surprised, but disgusted : for what is more 
inconsistent with the modesty and domestic propriety of 
woman, than the office of public preaching or speaking ? 
Among the abuses of the Corinthian church rebuked by the 
Apostle, he notices the fact of women praying and preaching 
uncovered, which, he insinuates, places them rather in the 
condition of harlots. * 

" Madness," said Johnson, " frequently discovers itself 
merely by unnecessary deviation from the usual modes of 
the world. My poor friend Smart showed the disturbance 
of his mind by falling upon his knees, and saying his prayers 
in the street, or in any other unusual place. Now, although, 
rationally speaking, it is greater madness not to pray at all, 
than to pray as Smart did, I am afraid there are so many 
that do not pray, that their understanding is not called in 
question." 

Smart's piety was always exemplary and fervent. We 
are told that in composing his religious poems, he was fre- 
quently so impressed with sentiments of devotion as to write 
particular passages on his knees. 

He wrote many witty poems, such as " The pretty Bar- 
keeper of the Mitre," under the signature of " Mr. Lun," in 

* He once said, " Supposing a wife to be of a studious or argument- 
ative turn, it would be very troublesome, for instance, if a woman 
should continually dwell upon the subject of the Arian heresy." Sir 
Walter Scott advised men never to marry religious wives ; by which he 
probably meant, as above, controversial, or, it may be, canting ones ! 
But Hannah More noticed also the watchwords of ladies not religious, 
saying, " Observe only, whether, after you have heard a lady begin to 
speak of the clergy, under the appellation of the parsons, you do not in 
a short time hear Christianity spoken of as a particular system,'^ &c. 
This was about the time of the French Revolution, 1798. 



THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 269 

the Student ; and his hnes on the sudden death of a clergy- 
man (one of his serious poems), thus end : 

" Better than what the pencil's daub can give, 
Better than all that Phidias ever wrought, 
Is this — that what he taught shall ever live, 
And what he lived for ever shall be taught." 

In common with literary men, he had much shyness of 
manner. It is related of him, that having undertaken to 
introduce his wife to Lord Darlington, he had no sooner men- 
tioned her name to his lordship, than he retreated suddenly, 
as if stricken with a panic, from the room, and from the 
house, leaving her to follow, overwhelmed with confusion. 

Johnson evidently had him in view, when at another time, 
he said, " Many a man is mad in certain instances, and 
goes through life without having it perceived. For example, 
a madness has seized a person, of supposing himself obliged 
literally to pray continually ; had the madness turned the 
opposite way, and the person thought it a crime ever to pray, 
it might not improbably have continued unobserved." Even 
in these remarks, the religious integrity of Johnson's mind 
is seen. 

Let us close these remarks on Methodism with a quota- 
tion from a book * written by a man of sense and of great dis- 
cernment. He is speaking of humility, and the false humilities, 
and has just told us that the most common of the spurious 
humilities is that by which a general language of self-dispar- 
agement is substituted for- a distinct discernment, and specific 
acknowledgment of our real faults ; that the humble indi- 
vidual of this class will declare himself to be very incontest- 
ably a miserable sinner, but at the same time there is no 
particular fault or error that can be imputed to him from 
which he will not find himself to be happily exempt, when 
he goes on to say, f " Of all false humilities, the most false 
is to be found in that meeting of extremes, wherein humility 
is corrupted into pride. John Wesley, when he was desir- 
ous to fortify his followers against ridicule, taught them to 

* Notes from Life, in Six Essays, by Henry Taylor, 3d. edit. p. 50. 
Published by Murray, 
t P. 54, 55. 



270 THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 

court it. " God forbid," said he, " that we should not be 
the laughing-stock of mankind." But it is through pride, 
and not in humility, that any man will desire to be a laugh- 
ing-stock. And though it may seem at first sight that he 
|has attained to an independence of mankind when he can 
brave their laughter, yet this is a fallacious appearance ; it 
will be found that so far as his humility was corrupted, his 
independence was undermined ; and while courting the ridi- 
cule of the world, he is in reality courting the admiration 
and applause of his imrty or sect, or fearing their rebuke. 
This is the dependence into which he has fallen, and there 
is probably no slavery of the heart which is comparable to 
that of sectarian pride. Moreover, Mr. Wesley's followers 
doubtless deemed that the laughers were in danger of hell- 
fire. Where then was their charity when they desired to 
be laughed at by all mankind ? Or if (without desiring it) 
they deemed mankind, themselves only excepted, to be in so 
reprobate a state that the religious must needs be a laugh- 
ing-stock — was this their humility ? I wish to speak of Mr. 
Wesley with respect, not to say reverence ; but in this in- 
stance I think that his appeal was made to a temper of 
mind in his followers which was not purely Christian. It is 
not the meek who will throw out this sort of challenge and 
defiance ; and it is pride and not humility which we shall 
find to lie at the bottom of any such ostentatious self-abase- 
ment, 

" For pride, 
Which is the devil's toasting fork, doth toast 
Him brownest that his whiteness vaunteth most." 

There is certainly something very unpleasing, to say the 
least of it, in the ideas of the inferior class of Methodists. 
Their notions, we may observe (though this is not the place 
to enlarge upon them), that they are instantly saved, and of 
their perfection, are as inconsistent as they are absurd ; for 
what advantage is there in their belief of sudden salvation, 
and of perfection, when on the very next day to their pro- 
fession of such blessings, they may not be in possession of 
either ? • No, the language of the Lord's Prayer, and the 



THE WESLEYAN METHODISTS. 271 

general toiie of the Liturgy of the Church of England, must 
be the language and feeling of every Christian man unto his 
dying day. He is a sinner unto the last, looking only for 
salvation to the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. The remark 
of a French critic * on the Greek statuaries is singular and 
delicate. " They never," says he, " presumed to make use 
of the perfect tense, when the artist set his name to the 
statue. It was always eTroirjae, not zrenoLTjKr]. He never 
ventured to affirm that his work was perfect." The ap- 
plication is obvious ; let us acknowledge its lesson in our- 
selves. 

" A man," observes the pious Cecil, " who thinks himself 
to have attained Christian perfection, in the sense in which 
it has been insisted on by some persons" (in evident allusion 
to Methodists), " either deceives himself by calling sin in- 
firmity — or the demon of pride overcomes the demon of 
lust." 

How admirably and charitably does Southey conclude his 
" Life of Wesley," with the hope that Wesley ans may be 
led to act in closest union with the church I and he says, 
" The obstacles to this are surely not insuperable, perhaps not 
so difficult as they may appear." Let us believe and hope 
that this union may be at no distant time thoroughly effected 
and thus one cause of scandal against Christianity be removed. 

* Andrewes's Anecdotes, p. 60. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

Dr. Johnson's principles and feelings were ever ranged 
on the side of authority, antiquity, and establishment. We 
must not be surprised, therefore, to find him more favorably 
inclined toward the Roman Catholic than the Presbyterian 
church : but we may always be gratified in knowing that he 
rejected error under whatever countenance of authority it 
might be broached, and in common with all great minds 
loved truth in its solidity and simplicity. Devoutness of 
heart, constant mindfulness of the presence of God, reliance 
on the work of Christ, prayer for the guiding and sustaining 
influences of the Holy spirit — these formed his religion, and 
he sought more the practice of these, than the mere excite- 
ment of listening to extemporaneous preachers, or any en- 
deavor to invent and broach new systems of doctrine. 

There is a conversation of Johnson's recorded, which shows 
to us the chastened sentiments of a really God-fearing and 
God- worshiping mind. It took place at Oxford between him- 
self and Dr. Adams, the Master of Pembroke College. John- 
son said, " I know of no good prayers but those in the ' Book 
of Common Prayer.' " Dr. Adams observed, in a very earn- 
est manner, " I wish, sir, you would compose some family 
prayers." Johnson replied, " I will not compose prayers for 
you, sir, because you can do it for yourself. But I have 
thought of getting together all the books of prayers which I 
could, selecting those which should appear to me the best, 
putting out some, inserting others, adding some prayers of my 
own, and perfixing a discourse on prayer." " We all now 
gathered about him," relates Boswell, " and two or three of 
us at a time joined in pressing him to execute this plan. He 
seemed to be a little displeased at the manner of our impor- 
tunity, and in great agitation call out, ' Do not talk thus of 



^ 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 273 

ichat is so aivful. I know not what time God will allow 
me in this world. There are many things which I wish to 
do.' Some persisted, and Dr. Adams said, ' I never was 
more serious about any thing in my life.' Johnson exclaimed, 
' Let me alone — let ine alone — / am overpoivered.' And 
then he put his hands before his face, and reclined for some 
time upon the table." We have now his Meditations and 
Prayers, which are very valuable, and wholly his own, as 
arranged by Dr. Strahan, although we may believe that this 
gentleman had no license for their publication from Dr. John- 
son himself. 

It must be conceded, that devoutness is a characteristic 
more of the Roman Catholic than the Protestant church. 
We see Roman Catholic chapels open throughout the day, 
and nearly at all hours persons are entering them, and, quietly 
kneeling down, while deep silence reigns throughout the place, 
they offer up their prayers. Whatever be the nature of those 
prayers, the spirit of devotion is there. And while this con- 
tinual refreshment of the soul — for such, if sincere, it must 
needs be to a Roman Catholic — is being experienced, there 
is nothing of a religious kind going on in Protestant churches, 
or Protestant houses. The door of their sanctuary is closed 
from Sunday to Sunday, and if laid open, no one enters it for 
the purpose of unseen and silent prayer ; no little company, 
relying on the gracious promise of Christ's presence, is there ; 
and nothing induces our people to gather together in the 
temple, unless preaching be announced. There is a principle 
prevailing in the bosoms of our Roman Catholic brethren, 
which we need to cherish in our own ; and for which we who 
boast of a purer faith and more primitive practice ought to be 
more eminent. We are all looking out for gifts rather than 
for giving, and thus we may be too lamentably liable to foster 
feelings of conceit and selfishness rather than those attendant 
on humble-mindedness and holiness of heart. Let us show 
forth Dr. Johnson as a firm, undeviating Church of England 
man, yet without uncharitableness toward his Roman Cath- 
olic brethren : and because of his liberality and charity, often, 
as in the case of Grotius and others, misrepresented as lean- 
ing too much toward Popery in its entireness. 

M* 



274 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

Boswell once said to him, " So, sir, you are no great enemy 
to the Roman Catholic religion ? " 

Johnson. — " No more, sir, than to the Presbyterian re- 
ligion." 

Boswell. — " You are joking." 

Johnson. — " No, sir, I really think so. Nay, sir, of the 
two, I prefer the Popish I" And he then entered into some 
reasons of which we have before treated. In the above re- 
mark, we see nothing more than a little preference given to 
the one more than the other : but he disliked them both. 
The feeling which we have above noted, together with his 
political principles, would necessarily lead him to give some 
preference to the E-oman Catholic religion, and yet, if we in 
any way measure his dislike of it by his dislike of the Presby- 
terian manner, we must see that he disapproved it greatly, 
although for very different reasons. 

Of conversion from the Roman Catholic church he said, as 
reported by Sir William Scott, " A man who is converted 
from Protestantism to Popery, may be sincere : he parts with 
nothing : he is only superadding to what he already had. 
But a convert from Popery to Protestantism gives up so much 
of what he has held as sacred as any thing that he retains — 
there is so much laceration of mind in such a conversion, 
that it can hardly be sincere and lasting." Boswell, the 
Presbyterian, adds, " The truth of this reflection may be con- 
firmed by many and eminent instances, some of which will 
occur to most of my readers." 

Croker expresses himself as not aware of such instances, 
and thinks that Boswell alluded to Gibbon, whose conversion 
from Protestantism to Popery, and back again, and which 
ended in infidelity, is not a case in point. A direct case, in 
our days, has occurred in that of Blanco White : and he also 
states that many hundreds, on giving up Popery, fall into in- 
fidelity — they must believe all or none — for, probably, they 
have been accustomed to believe so much, that they think 
our religion too meagre for notice. 

Bishop Elrington expressed his suprise, that Johnson 
should have forgotten Latimer, Ridley, Hooper, and all those 
of all nations, who have renounced Popery. To many 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 275 

zealous Protestants this remark of Dr. Johnson's will be an 
exceedingly startling one. And yet we can, on deliberation, 
well discern a goodness in his meaning. Infidelity was 
always the horror of his mind : he could not sit in company 
with an infidel. His idea is, Better believe too much than 
too little ; and he fears, in many minds, the effect of a 
descent from the greater to the lesser, lest the man should 
find himself rolled impetuously to the bottom of the hill, 
when he should have walked calmly to his residence on the 
middle of it. "We must remember, tooi, that a Roman 
Catholic parts from what he has been taught to regard as 
sacred, though we regard it as akin to profane : and while we 
may say that we lead him to other doctrines which may 
better fill up his mind, yet the shock is in some degree or 
another inevitable, and the multitude can not bear such a 
shock, although it be from mere superstitious ideas and ob- 
servances. Yet no man can read the two articles following 
after the Preface to our Book of Common Prayer — no man 
can look into the addenda of creed and ceremony in the 
Roman Catholic church — and not pronounce restoration to 
be absolutely desirable : and therefore, the Protestant is not 
responsible for some or many untoward effects accruing from 
a lessening of hold on Popish superstitions and practices, and 
it is his duty to win minds from these, whatever he may think 
of the feasibility of holding a true saving belief in conjunction 
with them, on all essential points of the Christian religion. 
Dr. Johnson's observation should certainly excite to great 
care and preparation in the matter of attempting and effect- 
ing conversions from the Roman Catholic to the Protestant 
religion, and thus regarded as an exhortation, it may be of 
eminent advantage, however we might dislike it if viewed in 
the light of daunting or preventing men in a work for which 
the Church of England is so well adapted, so well accoutred, 
and offering such a substantial settledness in a home as fully 
sacred as it is really primitive. 

Let us proceed to a sort of examination of Johnson by 
Boswell, on certain Roman Catholic points of belief He 
asked, " What do you think, sir, of Purgatory, as believed by 
the Roman Catholics ?" 



276 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

Johnson. — " Why, sir, it is a very harmless doctrine. 
They are of opinion that the generaUty of mankind are 
neither so obstinately wicked as to deserve everlasting punish- 
ment, nor so good as to merit being admitted into the society 
of blessed spirits : and therefore, that God is graciously 
pleased to allow of a middle state, where they may be purified 
by certain degrees of suffering. You see, sir, there is nothing 
unreasonable in this." 

Johnson states this doctrine fairly, and according to the 
E.oman Catholic behef : at least, just as it is laid down by 
the Rev. Dr. George Hay.* And the celebrated Dr. Milner, 
after quoting the texts of Luke xii. 59 ; Matt. xii. 32 ; 
Luke xvi. 22; 1 Cor. iii. 13, 15; 1 Pet. iii. 19, &c., on 
which the doctrine is founded, and the analogies by which it 
is inferred, gives very Protestant authorities for the practice 
of praying for the dead, and among others, " the religious Dr. 
Johnson, whose published Meditations prove, that he con- 
stantly prayed for his deceased wife."t 

Dr. Milner also states, that the famous Dr. Priestley, be- 
ing on his death-bed, called for Simpson's work on the Dura- 
tion of Future Punishments, which he recommended in these 
terms, " It contains my sentiments ; we shall all meet finally : 
we only require different degrees of discipline, suited to our 
different tempers, to prepare us for final happiness. "| 

But this is a presumptuous notion, unwarranted by God's 
word. Those who heard our Lord speak (Matt. xxv. 41) 
would, considering the known opinion of the Jews and an- 
cients, certainly receive the word "everlasting" in its unre- 
stricted sense ; and it has been pithily observed, if there is Tio 
everlasting punishment, neither is there everlasting reward 
or hap])iness ; for the same word is used to denote the dura- 
tion of either. At the same time, we might hold the doctrine 

* Hay's " Sincere Christian instructed in the Faith of Christ, from 
the Written Word." Richardson, Derby. Vol. ii. p. 115. 

t "The End of Religious Controversy," by the Rev. John Milner, 
D.D. F.S.A. p. 416. Dr. Johnson prayed for his deceased wife only 
after a conditional manner, and vpith extreme reverence and modesty ; 
different from the prayer of St. Augustine for his pious mother Monica. 

t Is not Dr. M. wrong in applying this, which relates rather to the 
doctrine of universal redemption than to purgatory ? 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 277 

of both eternal and limited punishments without much harm, 
inasmuch as we know, that as regards human laws, certainty 
more than severity of punishment influences mankind, and 
many may be led to commit lesser offenses under the idea 
that God will not assign them to eternal perdition for such, 
while they might be induced to avoid such ofienses under the 
belief that they would certainly be punished painfully, though 
not eternally, for their committal, in the next life. Yet, let 
us allow that the reasonable necessity for this doctrine of 
Purgatory is much weakened, when we consider that there 
are differerent degrees* of reward and glory in heaven, so 
that the loss of any degree of final happiness ought to act as 
a powerful persuasive with men to abstain from every kind 
of oflense, and to seek the aid of the grace of God for such 
entire abstinence. 

Dr. Johnson appears to have had no doubt of a middle 
state : and no man can deny the existence of paradise as in- 
ferior to the highest heaven. f He only doubted whether he 

* This doctrine is well argued by Dr. Green, Bishop of Lin- 
coln, in a tract (The Four La^ Things) published by the Christian 
Knowledge Society. 

■f Dr. Field, in his support of Calvin against the imputations of Bel- 
larraine, tells us, that " the custom of remembering the departed, 
naminij their names at the Holy Table, &c. was a most ancient and 
godly custom; neither is it in any way disliked by us. And surely it 
appears, that this was the cause that Aerius was condemned of hereti- 
cal rashness, in that he durst condemn this laudable and ancient cus- 
tom of the commemoration of the dead. In this sort they did most re- 
ligiously observe and keep, at the Lord's Table, the commemoration 
of all the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, evangelists, martyrs, and con- 
fessors, yea of Mary the mother of our Lord, to whom it can not be 
conceived, that by prayer they did wish deliverance out of purgatory, 
since no man ever thought them to be there ; but if they wished any 
thing, it was the deliverance from the power of death, which as yet 
tyrannizeth over one part of them ; the speedy destroying of the last 
enemy, which is death, the hastening of their resurrection, and joyful 
public acquittal of them in that great day wherein they shall stand to 
be judged before the Judge of the quick and dead. This was the prac- 
tice of the whole church, and this the meaning of their commemorations 
and prayers, which was good, and no way to be disliked." He states 
further, that " men out of their own private errors and fancies used such 
prayers for the dead, as the Romanists themselves dare not justify." 
(Dr. Field's Book of the Church, book iii. chap. xvii. Edit. 1606. 



278 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

might be allowed to pray for a deceased person : and he only 
prayed thus conditionally, not positively, as Dr. Milner would 
have us believe that he did. In a prayer for his departed 
wife, we have his two opinions blended : " And, O Lord, so 
far as it may be laivful in me, I commend to thy Fatherly 
goodness the soul of my departed wife : beseeching thee to 
grant her whatever is best ui her present state, and finally 
to receive her to eternal hap2}iness." Who can object to 
this, when we know that the resurrection and the judgment 
must take place previous to the final destination of a soul ; 
and no soul would be brought out of hell or heaven to be 
judged ? Surely, therefore, there must be a middle state in 
which the soul is placed after its flight from this world, and 
previous to its union with the body at the resurrection, and 
in the judgment. It would be a blessed privilege, especially 
in certain cases, if we might be permitted to follow the dead 
with our prayers ; but still, we dare not trust that such per- 
mission is granted, for, excepting in the Apocrypha, we have 
no clear intimation in the sacred Scriptures of its allowance. 

Croker observes, that soinctimes Dr. Johnson prays, that 
the Almighty may " have had mercy'' on the departed, as if 
he believed the sentence to have been already pronounced. 
Yes, He may have had mercy; but this decides not the sen- 
tence in its fullness : that irrevocable sentence which is to be 
delivered on the Judgment Day. 

"But then, sir, continued Boswell, "their masses for the 
dead ?" Johnson. — " Why, sir, if it be once established that 
there are souls in Purgatory, it is as proper to pray for them, 
as for our brethren of mankind who are yet in this life." 

Boswell. — "The idolatry of the Mass." 

Johnson. — " Sir, there is no idolatry in the Mass. They 
believe God to be there, and they adore Him." 

They believe a piece of bread to be God, and adoring God, 
and not a piece of bread, they are not guilty of idolatry. 
Were the piece of bread only representative of God, and did 

also the Appendix to Book iii.) His remarks on this subject, which he 
regards as Protestant doctrine and generally allowed, may not be agree- 
able to the tone of much of the religion of the present day, but they 
fully bear out Dr. Johnson. 



ROiMAN CATHOLICS. 279 

they adore it, they would be guilty of idolatry. This seems 
to be Dr. Johnson's excuse for them ; an excuse valid enough 
for escape from the charge, founded on the marvelous mon- 
strosity of their belief. On this ground, the Heathens who 
worship and pray to images as gods, are cleared from the 
charge of idolatry. In both Catholic and Heathen the wor- 
ship may be consistent with the belief; but the belief is mon- 
strous. Let us mark how these erroneous doctrines and 
practices all consistently proceed one out of the other. If 
there be Purgatory, then prayers for the dead ; if individual 
prayers and sacrifice, then united and public prayer and sacri- 
fice also. 

The above words of Dr. Johnson must not be read as an 
approval of the Mass, and as though he thought no idolatry 
was involved in its adoration. No, he merely states what 
might be the consistent practice springing out of a certain 
belief. He himself did not believe God to be there : for he 
did not hold the doctrine of Transubstantiation. "If," he 
once said, after quoting Tillotson, " God had never spoken 
figuratively, we might hold that he speaks literally, when He 
says, ' This is my Body.' " Boswell pressed him by saying, 
" But what do you say, sir, to the ancient and continued 
tradition of the church upon this point ?" Johnson. — 
" Tradition, sir, has no place where the Scriptures are plain ; 
and tradition can not persuade a man into a belief of tran- 
substantiation. Able men, indeed, have said they believed 
it." On another occasion when, as Boswell tells us, he was 
in a frame "calm, gentle, wise, holy," he spoke against the 
belief of transubstantiation. This is necessary to be observ- 
ed, lest we rashly accuse him of showing too much favor to 
Roman Catholic doctrines, whereas he only seeks to excuse 
their consistency, not their creed. 

"The worship of saints?" further exclaimed Boswell. 
Johnson. — " Sir, they do not worship saints : they invoke 
them : they only ask their prayers." But he was opposed 
to the invocation of saints. Toplady, speaking of Romanists, 
asked, " Does not their invocation of saints suppose omnipres- 
ence in the saints ?" " No, sir, it supposes only pluri-pres- 
ence ; and when spirits are divested of matter, it seems 



280 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

probable that they should see with more extent than when 
in an embodied state. There is therefore no approach to an 
invasion of any of the Divine attributes, in the invocation of 
saints. But I think it is loill-icorship and 'presumjytion. 
I see no command for it, and therefore think it safer not to 
practice itT 

There seems to be an over refinement in the distinction 
between omnipresence and pluri-presence. We can only un- 
derstand it in this way ; namely, that the departed saints 
are allowed to hear the prayers of all those whom they knew 
on earth ; a privilege which they did not possess on earth, 
because their bodies confined them to one spot. Thus, when 
in the flesh, only those friends who could be about them and 
see them, could say, " Pray for me :" but now, having cast 
off the body, the spirit could have greater freedom, and be 
enabled to see and hear those who called and besought them 
from a distance, as well as those who were nigh. Still only 
the voice of friends would reach them : for the doctrine would 
be held under the idea of an earthly taint of saintship still 
clinging to them, and with the belief that God would gra- 
ciously allow a sainted spirit on the earth to call to its sainted 
sister or brother in heaven, and thus effectually realize the 
communion of saints — of all saints that were joined on earth 
of the dead and of the living. This would be the idea of 
pluri-presence : ' and then we extend it further, and suppose 
all the church in Heaven to be mindful of the whole church 
on earth with permission to hear and urge the requests of in- 
dividuals of the church militant, and then we arrive at the 
idea of omnipresence. 

" As to the invocation of saints," said Dr. Johnson, at an- 
other time, " though I do not think it authorized, it appears 
to me, that ' the communion of saints' in the Creed means 
the communion with the saints in heaven, as connected with 
' the holy Catholic Church.' Yes, they may be united with 
ixs, and we sliall be united with them. They may be united 
with, and regardful of us (Rev. vi. 9—11), and we know 
that M^e, if faithful and holy, are to be hereafter with ' the 
spirits of just men made perfect.' " 

But the communion of saints is a verv different matter 



EOMAN CATHOLICS. 281 

•from the invocation of saints. We may believe that the 
sanits can pray for us,* and with a purer and stronger power 
of prayer, in their disembodied state, although we dare not 
pray to them. They could pray for us when on the earth — 
why not when in Paradise ? Their prayers then for us would 
not hinder Christ's gracious intercession for our souls, any 
more than their prayers on earth did ; and, " Brethren, pray 
for us," is a grand exhortation of St. Paul. Our Reformers 
held this belief,! and it is a comfortable one, in no way de- 

* Dr. Field supports this view in some very remarkable passages 
(book iii. chap. 31), fully coinciding with Bishop Ken's sentiments. 
He is treating on the Heresies of Vigilantius, saying, " The next heresy 
that we are supposed to fall into, is that of Vigilantius. The opinions 
imputed to him by Jerome, and disliked, are these : The first, that 
the saints departed pray not for the living, &c." Dr. Field answers, 
" For the opinions wherewith Jerome chargeth him, this we briefly 
answer. First, if he absolutely denied that the saints departed do pray 
for us, as it seemeth ITe did by Jerome's reprehension, we think he 
erred. For we hold they do pray in genere.'''' See also Appendix to 
book iii. Answer to Brereley's Objections. 

t Bishop Ridley wrote thus to a fellow-martyr, " Brother Bradford, 
as long as I shall understand thou art in thy journey, by God's grace 
I shall call upon our heavenly Father, for Christ's sake, to let thee 
safely home : and then, good brother, speak you, and pray for the rem- 
nant which are to sufier for Christ's sake ; according to that thou shalt 
then know more clearly." — -Letters of the Martyrs. Edited by the 
Rev. Edward Bickersteth. 

The sainted Bishop Ken, one of the greatest glories of our church, 
and worthy to be reckoned among the luminaries of the Church Catho- 
lic — in his " Exposition of the Church Catechism," which received the 
imprimatur of the Archbishop of Canterbury's chaplain in the year 
1665, says, " I believe, O most holy Jesu, that thy saints here below, 
have communion with thy saints above (Heb. xii. 22) ; they praying for 
us in heaven, we are on earth celebrating their memorials, rejoicing at 
their bliss, giving Thee thanks for their labor of love, and imitating 
their examples — for which all love, all glory be to Thee." These 
■words are copied as they stand in the original edition ; but probably 
the word " ai-e" should be " here." 

Bishop Heber's beautiful letter of condolence to Miss Stone, in " Nar- 
rative of a Journey," &c. vol. iii. p. 309, is well known. He says, 
"That the spirits in Paradise pray for those whom they have left be- 
hind, I can not doubt, since I can not suppose that they cease to love 
us there ; and your dear brother is thus still employed in your service 
and still recommending you to the throne of mercy, to the all-sufficient 
and promiseil help of that God who is the Father of the fatherless, and 



282 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

pendent on the truth or error of the doctrine of the invo 
cation of saints. They may be enabled to pray not only for 
friends left behind, but for the whole world of men, and in doing 
this in Paradise, they would do no more than what they were 
allowed to do when mortals on the earth. They would still 
pray, not in their own strength, but through the " one Medi- 
ator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus." 

"I am talking all this time," said Johnson, "of the doc- 
trines of the Church of Rome. I grant you that, in prac- 
tice, Purgatory is made a lucrative imposition, and that the 
people do become idolatrous as they recommend themselves 
to the tutelary protection of particular saints." 

The vast and ridiculous extent to which this tutelary 
guardianship is carried, is readily discerned by all who know 
any thing of the practices of Romanists. And yet, in a 
work highly esteemed among them, first published by their 
eminent divine Gother, and republished by Bishop Challoner, 
these two remarkable sentences occur : " Cursed is he that 
believes the saints in heaven to be his redeemers, that prays 
to them as such, or that gives God's honor to them, or to any 
creature whatsoever. Amen." " Cursed is every goddess 
worshiper, that believes the blessed Virgin Mary to be any 
more than a creature ; that worships her or puts his trust in 
her more than in God ; that believes her above her Son, or 
that she can in any thing command Him. Amen." Let 
us bind our Roman Catholic brethren to this, and there is 
an end of their idolatry. But we know the sentiments and 
practice of the great mass of them to be otherwise ;* and, 
indeed, their divines must be aware of it, or these prohibitions 
would not have been issued. 

of that blessed Son whe hath assured us that they who mourn shall be 
comforted." 

We find, also, that truly evangelical minister, the late Rev. Hugh 
Stowell, state it as his hope that he may be permitted to pray for his 
children with more power than when on earth ; and, if so, promising 
them his prayers. 

Of the communion of the earthly and heavenly church, see 1 Cor. 
xii. 12, 13; Ephes. i. 10; Heb. xii. 23; Rev. vi. 9; xii. 11. See 
also Dr. Field's Third Book on the church, chapters 17 and 31. 

* See Tyler's " What is Romanism ?" being Tracts published by 
the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 283 

We come nearest to the invocation of saints or angels, 
collectively, when we chant our favorite doxology, 

"Praise God, from whom all blessings flow; 
Praise Him, all creatures here below ; 
Praise Him, above, ye heavenly host, 
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost." 

Bixt here there is no abuse of doctrine — no trusting in angels 
or saints for blessing or guardianship from them ; it is mere 
acknowledgment of the oneness of the church in glory and in 
the church in weakness, and with this acknowledgment an 
invitation. 

" Confession ?" persevered Boswell. Johnson. — " Why, 
I don't know but that is a good thing. The Scripture says, 
' Confess your faults one to another ;' and the priests confess 
as well as the laity. Then it must be considered that their 
absolution is only upon repentance, and often upon penance 
also. You think your sins may be forgiven without penance, 
upon repentance alone." 

This is rightly stated, for the best Roman Catholic 
authorities tell us, that confession of sins is necessary for ob- 
taining absolution ; without it, the grace of the sacrament of 
penance will not be bestowed. There can be no doubt that 
confession of sins is a Scriptural doctrine, and that its practice 
is incumbent on every Christian. But the Roman Catholic 
church by its custom utterly deprives such a practice of its 
very essence. For what should confession be ? Open and 
honest, and before all men. How is it with Romanists ? 
Dark and concealed, and only to a priest, who is bound not 
to divulge it. What is the object of confession, and what 
would be its result ? Its object is the exposure of the heart, 
especially to those who have most interest in knowing your 
heart ; and the result would be, that no concealment of crime 
would ever be kept up ; and hence, when men felt they must 
confess, crime would almost cease. What use to cheat a 
man in a bill if you must go and tell him of it the next week, 
and make reparation ? Tell him ; not tell it only to another 
man who you know must not tell it to another, and then 
practice a secret penance of some kind, thus giving false 



284 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

satisfaction to your own deceived heart, and doing no good to 
your defrauded neighbor. In short, confession is another 
terra for an opened heart ; but, depend upon it, true and 
honest confession of sins is the hardest task that ever was, or 
ever can be imposed on the human heart. It is one of the 
main things needed to regenerate the world (it is a fruit of 
the spiritual mind), but it is the last that the tongue of man 
will duly perform. 

Confession of sins should be made to the clergy, it is true ; 
but not to them only. It should always be made to them, 
because they are the instructors of those that are gone out 
of the way, the healers of the broken-hearted, the physicians 
of the soul. How can they prescribe so well, as when they 
know the especial complaint under which divers persons are 
respectively laboring, unless they know the sin which doth so 
easily beset them ? See how you tell your bodily physician 
all your bodily ailments, how minute and careful you are ; 
and if you miss acquainting him with any particular circum- 
stance, his efforts may not meet your case. So should you 
be careful with your spiritual physician, but not with him 
only, but M'ith others. For if you trust a secret to him which 
you wish others not to know, you place yourself in his power ; 
and although he may never desire to make use of this power 
to your disadvantage in any way, yet, as a general rule, con- 
fession to the clergy only would be found to be inconvenient, 
as well as missing its essential mark; and, indeed, no con- 
fession should be made to the clergy without giving full per- 
mission to them to divulge it to some others ; and a main 
object of your going to a minister for confession should be, 
that he might, at your earnest desire, communicate it to the 
persons whom you had injured in any way, provided no 
serious hurt vi'ould accrue to others from such confession. 

Some kinds of Christians, the Wesleyans for instance, ap- 
proach near to the system of the confessional. They confess 
their sins in their band-meetings, but then these are private, 
only entered by means of a ticket, and perhaps the confessions 
are not divulged, especially to those who have most interest 
in knowing them. A Wesleyan may exhibit sorrow for sin, 
he may say that he has been sorely tempted, and he may 



EOilAN CATHOLICS. 285 

seek the aid of the prayers of his brethren ; but •«nll he say, 
I have stolen a pair of stockings olT such a man's garden- 
hedge, and I must tell you and him of it ; I have entertained 
such and such a spite against such and such a person, and 1 
must out with it ; I have sold such 4 one an inferior article 
at too high a price, and I must go and tell him — will he do 
this ? for without this freeness and openness, let him not 
flatter himself that there can be confession : he is in no wise 
better than a Romanist. It has been observed, that too 
often a "Wesleyan confession or statement of experience is 
nothing more or less than a confession of virtues — that is, a 
confession of former sins and later virtues ; in this latter 
light the man wishing to be taken at his own word of him- 
self, when his actions ought to speak for him. not his tongue. 
There is an exceUent paper in the Rambler (No. 2S),* 
which ought to be read by every one who desires to know 
himself before he seeks to propagate his own reputation, and 
to find how men more grossly practice imposture on them- 
selves than on others. But real confession of sins, as they 
should be Scripturally confessed, is one of the best cures for 
the pride, the boasting, the imposture of man. 

Speaking of Wesleyans, we may note Wesley's large and 
charitable mind. Though so much opposed to Popery, he 
could say. " I firmly beheve that many members of the 
Church of Rome have been holy men, and that many are so 

* How excellent is this sentence: "There are men,"' writes Dr. 
Johnson, " who always confound the praise of goodness with the prac- 
tice, and who believe themselves mild and mot^erate, charitable and 
faithful, because they have exerted their eloquence in commendation of 
mildness, fidelity, and other virtues. This is an error almost universal 
among those that converse much with disputants, with such whose fear 
or interest disposes them to a seeming reverence for any declaration, 
however enthusiastic, and submission to any boast, however arrogant. 
Ha%-ing none to recall their attention to their lives, they rate themselves 
by the goodness q/" their opinions, and forget how i7xuch more ccisily men 
may shoic their virtue in their talk than in their actions.'^ 

Jt is well recorded of Sir Matthew Hale, that he for a long time 
concealed the consecration of himself to the stricter duties of religion, 
lest, by some flagitious and shameful action, he should bring piety 
into disgrace. This is related by Dr. Johnson, in No. 14 of the 
Rambler. 



286 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

now." And he says in another place, " Several of them 
have attained to as high a pitch of sanctity as human nature 
is capable of arriving at." 

Mrs. Fletcher, wife of the eminent Rev. John Fletcher of 
Madeley, says,* " Reading the life of Ignatius Loyola (the 
founder of the Jesuits), and especially what pains he took, 
and what labor he went through to gain souls, I could not 
but be struck at the glaring difference between him and me. 
One day, having taken a step he believed to be his duty, but 
which caused him both pain and ignominy, and being rebuked 
by a friend, he replied, ' I should not object to traverse all 
the streets of Paris barefoot, with horns on my head, and 
clothed in the most ridiculous habit, could it but gain one 
soul to God.' The conviction," she continues, " immediately 
struck me, that all I wanted was to be filled with the love 
of God, and that would produce every effect in its proper 
order. Lord, let my incessant cry be for this I Oh give me 
this most excellent gift of charity I" 

This excellent woman, and we love her for her love, not- 
withstanding all her dreams and extravagances, had a corre- 
spondence with a Roman Catholic priest, in which also she 
exhibits much loving comprehension of mind. She says, 
with remarkable concentration of light and love — for many, 
as Wesley said, have much love and but little light — she 
says, " With regard to the doctrine of Calvin, which repre- 
sents the love of God in a very wrong light, I therein agree 
with you, and mourn that so many good men do hold it. 
Had not Christ died for all, the apostles could not have been 
commanded ' to preach the Gospel to every creature.' " She 
reminds him how sweetly hereafter, they may forget the 
names of Romaiiist and Protestant : she commends the Life 
of M. de Rentz, as a book she much loves : and writes to 
the priest, " I can embrace you as a brother in the Lord, 
and regard you as such." 

Of this kind of generous disposition, was the pious Hannah 
More. She writes f to one of her sisters, of Dr. Johnson, 
'< He reproved me with pretended sharpness for reading, <■ Les 

* Her Life, p. 247. 

t Vol. i. p. 211 of her Life. 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 287 

Pensees de Pascal,' * or any of the Port Royal authors, 
alleging, that as a good Protestant, I ought to abstain from 
books written by Catholics. I was beginning to stand upon 
my defense, when he took me with both hands, and with 
a tear running down his cheeks, ' Child,' said he, with 
the most affecting earnestness, ' I am heartily glad that 
you read pious books by whomsoever they may be writ- 
ten.' " 

We may readily see, that Dr. Johnson's rebuke was pre- 
te7tded, for his manner was often playful ; and she evidently 
adopts his exhortation. Johnson really had large views of 
religion, for we have it recorded by Boswell, that once he and 
Johnson talked of the Roman Catholic religion, and how little 
difference there was in essential matters between it and 
Church of England, or Presbyterianism. Johnson said, " True, 
sir, all denomimations of Christians have really little differ- 
ence in point of doctrine, though they may differ widely in 
external forms. Thei'e is a prodigious difference between the 
external form of one of your Presbyterian churclies in Scot- 
land, and the church in Italy ; yet the doctrine taught is 
essentially the same." Boswell lets this pass without obser- 
A^ation or comment, so may we. We may, however, notice 
that it was manner in prayer and preaching that contribu- 
ted a good deal to prevent Johnson from entering a Presby- 

* Hannah More was al.so an ardent admirer of Fenelon, of whom 
we may relate this anecdote : Lord Peterborough, after a visit paid to 
Fenelon, Archbishop of Cambray, said to Pope, " Fenelon is a man 
that was cast in a particular mould, that was never made use of for 
any body else. He's a delicious creature. But I was forced to get 
from him as soon as I possibly could, for else he would have made me 
pious J^ — Warton^s Essay on Pope. 

Of our Warburton, much the same observation, though in a rather 
different sense, was made. When Lord-Chancellor Yorke had obtain- 
ed great reputation in public life, and the most brilliant prospects were 
before him, thus he addressed the great scholar and divine : " I en- 
deavor to convince myself it is dangerous to converse with you, for you 
show me so much more happiness in the quiet pursuits of knowledge 
and enjoyments of friendship than is to be found in lucre or ambition, 
that I go back into the world with regret, where few things are to be 
attained without more agitation, both of reason and the passions, than 
either moderate parts or a benevolent mind can support." — Lord 
Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors^ vol. v. p. 390. 



288 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

terian place of worship in Scotland ; he read the books of 
Scotch divines, and approved them. 

At another time, he repeated his observation, that the 
differences among Christians are really of no consequence. 
" For instance," he said, " if a Protestant objects to a Papist, 
' You worship images ; ' the Papist can answer, ' I do not 
insist on your doing it ; you may be a very good Papist with- 
out it ; I do it only as a help to my devotion.' " This is 
very liberal, but still a Protestant may say, I not only wish 
to avoid worshiping of images myself, but I go further, and 
desire to discountenance any society in which it is done, and 
thus protect others as well as clear myself It is but fair to 
mention, that nothing do the Roman Catholics repel with 
greater indignation than the idea that any worship or adora- 
tion is paid by them to images, so that any one can love, 
adore, and trust in an image as his God. They abhor and 
detest such a thought, and bitterly complain of the injustice 
of the accusation. * 

CONVENTS AND MONASTERIES. 

Of convents and monasteries he spoke much. " If I were 
to visit Italy," he said, " my curiosity would be more attract- 
ed by convents than by palaces ; though I am afraid that I 
should find expectation in both places equally disappointed, 
and life in both places supported with impatience and quitted 
with reluctance." In this remark we observe two prevailing 
habits of his own mind — his religion, preferring convents to 
palaces ; his fear of death, expecting to find it reign in relig- 
ious and irreligious people alike. We may regret that a visit 
to Italy, projected at two periods of his life, did not take 
place. 

He said, " If convents should be allowed at all, they should 
only be retreats for persons unable to serve the public, or who 
have served it. It is our first duty to serve society, this 
service the fruit of our religion ; and, after we have done 
that, we may attend wholly to the salvation of our own souls. 

* See Dr. Hay's Sincere Christian, p. 231. 



ROiMAN CATHOLICS. 289 

A youthful passion for abstracted devotion should not be en- 
couraged." We may rightly ask : If all good people are to 
retire from the world, what would the world become ? Good 
people are the good leaven of society that maintain its integ- 
rity, t 

" There are no anchorites in heaven," says Bishop Patrick ; 
" why on earth ?" 

One day, a very fine one, he was walking among the ruins 
of St. Andrew's, and took off his hat while he was upon any 
part of the ground where the Cathedral had stood. He talk- 
ed of Knox and his mob, and he spoke of retirement from the 
world. He thought a man might retire when he had done 
his duty to society ; but love of his neighbor should cause him 
to bear a part in active life. " Those who are exceedingly 
scrupulous (which I do not approve, for I am no friend to 
scruples), and find their scrupulosity invincible, or those who 
can not resist temptations, and find they make themselves 
worse by being in the world, without making it better, may 
retire." His enthusiasm must have been rapidly excited by 
the scene around him, when he farther exclaimed, " I never 
read of a hermit, but in imagination I kiss his feet ; never of 
a monastery, but I could fall on my knees and kiss the pave- 
ment. But I think putting young people there, who know 
nothing of life, nothing of retirement, is dangerous and wick- 
ed." And by a subsequent sentence, he at once explains 
what he meant before, in saying that it is our first duty to 
serve society, &c., a saying which has been much misrepre- 
sented, as though we might serve the world for a time, and 
become religious in old age only. " It is a saying," he says, 
•' as old as Hesiod : "Epya vedv, fSovXac ts [Meacov, evyai ts 
yepovruiv* That is a very noble line : not that yoxmg men. 
should not lyraij, or old men not give counsel, but that every 

* Boswell translates this line by a couplet : 

^- "Let youth in deeds, in counsel man engage ; 

Prayer is the proper duty of old age." ^ 



1 Perhaps tlie'meaning is — The achievements of the young, the counsels of the mid- 
dle-aged, and the blessings (is not tiyri a prayer for a blessing ?) of the aged are best 

N 



•^DQ ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

season, of life has its proper duties. I have thought of retir- 
ing and have talked of it to a friend : but I find my vocation 
is rather to active life." The very threat of his withdrawal 
from society forms a powerful argument against any institution 
that would have allured so great a benefactor of mankind 
to take such a step ; though the love of retirement, as he tells 
us in the Rambler,* "has, in all ages, adhered closely to 
those minds which have been most enlarged by knowledge, 
or elevated by genius." No one could give better advice than 
his hermit gives to Obidah, the son of Abensena. f 

This entry appears in his Diary, when traveling in France ; 
" Monk not necessarily a priest. Benedictines rise at four, 
are at church an hour and a half; at church again half an 
hour before, half an hour after dinner ; and again from half 
an hour after seven to eight. They may sleep eight hours. 
Bodily labor wanted in monasteries. The poor taken into 
hospitals and miserably kept. Monks in the convent, fifteen, 
accounted poor." It will be remembered, how he tells us 
in the " Rambler"^ that monks are not necessarily poor ; 
they are certainly free from destitution, and the reverence 
paid to the sanctity of their character amply compensates all 
other distinctions which might have been won in the worldly 
life. 

Mrs. Piozzi records, " When we were at Rouen, he took 
a great fancy to the Abbe Rofi^ette, with them he conversed 
about the destruction of the Order of the Jesuits, and con- 
demned it loudly, as a blow to the general power of the 
church, and likely to be followed with many and dangerous 
innovations, which might at length become fatal to religion 
itself, and shake even the foundation of Christianity ; and 
we are further told, that Dr. Johnson pronounced a long 
eulogium upon Milton, with so much ardor, eloquence, and 
ingenuity, that the Abbe rose from his seat and embraced 
him. 

Yet neither Johnson nor the Abbe could have, in any 
wise, liked Milton's religious views. Johnson tells us, how 
" he had adopted the puritanical savageness of manners," and 

* Rambler, No. 7. t Ibid. No. 65 

$ Ibid. No. 203. 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 291 

" such is his mahgnity, that hell grows darker at his frown." 
He belonged to no church, had no stated hour of prayer, in 
public or private. At first he is said to have been Calvin- 
istic ; and when he began to hate the Presbyterians, he 
became Arminian. The Papists, because appealing to other 
testimonies than the Scripture, in his opinion, ought not to 
be permitted the liberty of either public or private worship : 
for though they plead conscience, " yet," he said, " we have 
no warrant to regard conscience which is not grounded in 
Scripture." We are reminded, by this enmity to Papists, 
of Prynne, the regicide, who actually made it a subject of 
serious accusation against the government, that he, when 
removed as a prisoner from Carnarvon Castle, was eom- 
peJled to set sail in a ship on board of which was a Roman 
Catholic I 

Great must have been their victory over prejudice, great 
their admiration of poetry's grandest hero, when the one 
could give, and the other applaud, so exalted a character and 
description of an ecclesiastical enemy. Milton, however, as 
Johnson has well stated, was not Avithout full conviction of 
the truth of Christianity, and the profoundest veneration for 
the holy Scriptures, but the strange matter is, that the 
author of " Paradise Lost" should not have been a worshiper 
in the Cathedral (and he appears to have had a poetical 
feeling in favor of Cathedrals in earlier life), rather than the 
upholder of conventicle, and that his political predilections 
should not have been of the Stuart rather than the Crom- 
wellian class. 
r» Talking again of religious orders, he said, " It is as unrea- 
sonable for a man to go into a Carthusian convent for fear 
of being immoral, as for a man to cut off his hands for fear 
he should steal. A man may do this," he says, "yet he 
tnay all his life be a thief in his heart. Their silence, too," 
he continued, " is absurd. We read in the Gospel of the 
Apostles being sent to preach, but not to hold their tongues. 
All severity that does not tend to increase good or prevent 
evil, is idle." In these remarks his strong common sense 
irresistibly breaks forth, and convinces. 

He went on, " I said to the Lady Abbess of a convent, 



292 ROMAN CATHOLICS. 

' Madam, you are here, not for the love of virtue, but the 
fear of vice.' She said, she should remember this as long as 
she lived." Boswell thought it hard of him to give her this 
view of her situation, when she could not help it. 

In the "Rambler" he discourses wisely :* "Austerity is 
the proper antidote to indulgence ; the diseases of mind, as 
well as body, are cured by contraries, and to contraries 
we should readily have recourse, if we dreaded guilt as 
we dread pain. The completion and sum of repent- 
ance is a clia7ige of life. That sorrow which dictates no 
caution, that fear which does not quicken our escape, that 
austerity tvhich fails to rectify our affections, are vain and 
unavailing. "V 

Indeed, often an ascetic life may only tend to foster spirit- 
ual pride ; ay, as much, or more, than platform applause, or 
congregational approval. In a book composed to exalt the 
merit of one set of monks, St. Peter is supposed to ask of St. 
Michael, who it is that knocks at the door; the answer is, 
"A Carmelite." "A Carmelite!" repeats St. Peter, peev- 
ishly ; "a Carmelite I I think we have none at the gate of 
heaven but Carmelites, from morning to night. Well, he 
must stay ; I shall not open the gate till there is a dozen 
together of them."t 

But monks, like other men, must succumb to the common 
fate, and give in their strict account. In the celebrated 
" Daunce of Machabree, made by Dan John Lydgate, Monke 

* That admirable paper, No. 110. 

t Christini of Sweden is reported to have been never oetter pleased * 
with a story, than that of a Normon cure's artifice to save the reputa- 
tion of his seigneur, who had the misfortune to be broken alive on the 
wheel, at the " Greve," for two or three robberies, and a murder. 

"We pray thee, Lord (said the ecclesiastic), for the soul of 

seigneur of this parish, who has lately died of his wounds at Paris." — 
Andrewes, p. 17. 

In the cruel persecution of the Protestants at Aix (1614), the Jesuits 
promised an unhappy victim, overcome by the entreaties of his wife and 
family, that if he would recant, his life should be spared. The man 
complied, and yet they led him forth to death. On the scaffold he up- 
braided them with this breach of faith ; but they told him, that hy the 
promise made him of life^ they did not mean this life, but that to come. 
— Gentleman's Magazine^ vol. xvii. p. 396. 



ROMAN CATHOLICS. 293 

of St. Edmund's Bury," when Death comes, in due turn, to 
take away the monk, we read : 

" Death speaketh to tho Monke. 

' Sir Monke also with your black habite, 
Ye may no longer here hold sojoure, 
There is nothing here that may you respite, 
Agein my might you for to do succour. 
Ye mot accompt touching your labour, 
How you have spend it in dede, word and thought, 
To earth and ashes turncth every floure, 
The life of man is but a thing of nought.' 

" The Monke maketh answer. 

'I had lever in the cloyster be, 
At my book and study my service. 
Which is a place contemplatif to see : 
But I have spent my life in merry wise, 
Like as a fool dissolute and nice, 
God of his mercy grant me repentance. 
By chere outward hard is to devise, 
All be not merry which that man see daunce.' " 



CHAPTER XVIII. 
MONASTICAL LIFE. 

The eremitical life lays claim to great antiquity, and its 
followers were looked upon always as the most sainted sons 
of religion. St. Chrysostom tells us that the first institutor 
of monachism was Samuel, in the Old Testament ; and St. 
Jerome, in his epistle to Rusticus, says, "The chief inventors 
and improvers of monachism were the sons of the prophets, in 
the Old Testament, who built huts near the river Jordon, and, 
quitting throngs and cities, lived upon barley cakes and wild 
herbs." And the same St. Jerome (a favorite Father with 
Presbyterians), writes, in his epistle to Paulinus, "We have 
the Apostles, Antony, Hilarion, and Macarius, for chiefs of 
our institute." Elijah and Elisha are also claimed as princes 
of the monastical life. So are the sons of Rechab, the Es- 
senes, &c. And the MS. in the Cotton Library thus con- 
tinues : " Having seen how it was represented under the 
Fathers of the Old Testament, it remains that we show how 
it was continued under those of the New. John the Baptist, 
who was between both the Testaments, flying * to the desert 
in his tender years, was the first institutor of monastical life 
imder the New Testament. Nay, Christ himself was, prop- 
erly, the institutor, when he ordered his disciples to sell all, 
to leave all things, and to follow him ; and after his Ascen- 
sion the faithful sold all they had, laid the price at the feet 
of the Apostles, and lived in common, under their care and 
direction, possessing nothing they could call their own. 

" After the martyrdom of the Apostles, many falling off* 
from their primitive fervor, began to seek the things of this 
world, and to possess them as their own, no.t in common, as 
before ; but very many holy Fathers retaining that Apostoli- 
cal fervor, and inspired by the Holy Ghost, continued to live 
* Yet we have no evidence of this. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 295 

under the direction of one in community, adding many snb- 
limer things to what had been practiced under the Apostles." 

Eusebius, in the second book of his Church History, tells 
us how, by the example of St. Mark and the influence of his 
vast number of converts in Egypt, the holy monastical in- 
stitute spread over all the world. Much more on this matter 
may be seen in Cassian, Sozomen, St. Jerome, and Epipha- 
nius. 

" The most renowned among these ancient monks," con- 
tinues the MS., " were Antony, Hilarion, the two Macarii, 
Pachomius, Aurelius, John the Father of 3000 monks, Se- 
rapion the Father of 10,000, Dioscorus the Father of 100, 
Julian the Father of 10,000, Amos of 3000, Theonas of 
3000, Paul of 500, Basil, Fructuosus, Ferreolus, Egyptius, 
Isidore, Aurehan, John Cassian, Jerome, and many more 
holy Fathers. At length succeeded St. Benedict, a strenu- 
ous hearer and fulfiller of the Evangelical precept, who 
shined out like a bright heavenly star; and he, about the 
year of our our Lord 516, was a resolute champion in Christ's 
warfare, in a monastery on Mount Cassino, and writ a com- 
mendable rule, approved of by the universal church, as Pope, 
Innocent IT. testifies." Previous to this date, at least nine 
eminent monks had written monastical rules. 
• Gregory of Nazianzen writes thus of the excessive auster- 
ity of the monks of Pontus : " Some torment themselves with 
chains of iron ; others, shut up like wild beasts, in streight 
houses, see no man : they fast and keep silence twenty whole 
days. O Cheist," he adds, " be favorable to those souls, 
who I confess are pious, but not discreet enough." 

In England the original and advancement of Christianity 
and monachism was nearly contemporary. Some of the 
Druids, who were priests of that pagan religion, became 
monks ; and their former life in its severity of discipline, in- 
clined them to the monastic form of Christianity. 

The monks of Glastonbury have endeavored to maintain 

the credit of a report, that in the year 3 1 after the Passion 

of our Lord, twelve of St. Philip the Apostle's disciples (chief 

of whom was Joseph of Arimathea*) came into this country 

* See Dnsdale's Monasticon. 



296 MONASTIC LIFE. 

and preached the Christian faith to Arviragus, who refused 
to embrace it, and yet granted them this place, with twelve 
hides of land ; where they made walls of wattles, and erect- 
ed the first church in this kingdom. These twelve, and their 
successors, continuing long the same number, and leading an 
eremetical life, converted a great multitude of pagans to the 
faith of Christ. 

This report, however, is shown by Ussher, in his Latin 
work, and Stillingfleet, in his English work on the British 
churches, to have been first produced in the Norman times, 
during the eleventh century, and was therefore unknown to 
the Saxon kings who had previously favored the rising of 
this foundation. But though Joseph of Arimathea* was 
never at Glastonbury, it may be allowed that an ancient 
British church was there, as described by Sir Henry Spel- 
man: and the antiquary Leland, vnih others, conjecture 
that some eremitical person named Joseph, with his com- 
panions, not only^ resided, but was interred there, and this 
circumstance led on to the story of the actual settlement and 
interment there of Joseph of Arimathea. 

This church, we are told, was the sacred repository of the 
ashes of a multitude of saints, insomuch that no corner of it 
or of the church-yard is destitute of the same. In so great 
reverence was it held, that people would not so much as spit 
in the church-yard ; and even from foreign countries the 
earth of this church-yard was sent for, to bury with the 
greatest persons. Here, as within the walls of lona, should 
Johnson have trod. 

The evidence in favor of St. Paul having preached the 
Gospel in Britain is very strong indeed, if not quite irrefraga- 
ble : especially when we consider that both classical and 
ecclesiastical writers agree that Britain was spoken of as " the 
utmost bounds of the west." Be this as it may concerning 
St. Paul, it seems to be satisfactorily proved that the Church] 
of England can trace, through its various gradations of the 
Tudor, Plantagenet, Norman, Anglo-Saxon, and British times, 
its origin upward to the Apostolic age. 

* See " The Church of England, apostolical in its Origin," &c. By- 
Rev. Thomas P. Pantin. M. A. Wertheim & Co. 1849. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 297 

The building of churches, the gifts of tithes by means of 
which we have now the Gospel without money and without 
price in the Church of England, the founding of monasteries, 
became in due time mighty examples of deep piety. " Cer- 
tainly," says a writer, " the fasts of these days were frequent, 
the prayers earnest, and the alms remarkable." 

At first these institutions were full of use to mankind, and 
without abuse. The style of living was poor and plain, 
while the labors were arduous. The rules said to have been 
prescribed to his monks, or canons, by St. Augustine, are all 
of a simple, self-denying character.* But we read, that 
these canons afterward growing wealthy, entirely fell ofl' from 
their strict discipline, indulging themselves in worldly pomps 
and excess, which produced another sort of those who were 
called Canons Hegulars, the others being called Secular, that 
is. Irregular, this making them decline so as to be almost 
lost: but they were again revived in the year of our Lord 
1380. 

Of the monks of Lanthony Abbey, we are informed, many 
lands were offered them, most of which they refused, choos- 
ing rather to live poor, than be involved in worldly solici- 
tude : for the king and queen (Henry the First) pressing 
them to accept of the whole province of Bergelay, they 
with earnest entreaties prevailed to be excused from admit- 
ting of it. 

The following was the form of receiving a Brother into 
the monastery. 

«' The first Petition in the Colloquium.! 

" Syr — I besyche you and alle the Convent, for the LufTc 
of God, our Lady Sanct Marye, Sant John of Baptiste, and 
alle the hoyle Courte of hevyne, that Qe wold resave me, 
to live and dye here among you in the state of a Monke, as 
prebendarye and servant unto alle to the Honour of God, 
solace to the company, proufiet to the place, and helth unto 
my sawle. 

* See Dugdale, vol. ii. p. 126. Also for sequent, 
f From a MS. in the Cotton Library, 

N* 



m.. 



298 MONASTIC LIFE. 

" The answer unto the Examinacyon. 

" Syr — I tryste, through the helpe of God, and your good 
prayers, to keepe all the things, which ye have heyr re- 
hersede. 

" The fyrst peticyon before the profession. 

" Syr — I have beyn heyr now this twell month near 
hand, and loyde be God, me lyks ryght well, both the order 
and the company ; whereupon I besyche you and all the 
Company for the lufFe of God, our Lady Sanct Marye, 
Sanct John of Baptist, and alle the hoyle company of hevyn, 
that ye will resave me unto my profession at my twell month 
day, according to my Petycion whyche I made when I was 
fyrst resaved heyr emongs you," &c. 

The very able and prudent writer of the Preface to Dugr 
dale's Monasticon, remarks, " The ancient structure and 
polity of our church is imperfect without the history of mon- 
asteries. The monks were formerly the greater part of the 
ecclesiastics, and the walls of convents were for a long time 
the fences of sanctity, and the better sort of literature. From 
that seminary came forth those mighty lights of the Chris- 
tian world, Bede, Alcuinus, Willebrod, Boniface, and others 
worthy of much honor for their learning, and for propagating 
the faith. Were it not for monks, we had certainly ever 
been mere children in the history of our country." Again, he 
observes, " There are certain zealots so religiously mad, as to 
say that the Religious Orders of the Gentils proceeded from 
the bottomless pit. So licentious is inclination in indulging 
itself:" and he proceeds, " When the monks were rooted out 
by the Danish wars, an universal ignorance overspread the 
land, insomuch that there was scarce any one in England 
that could read or write Latin ; but when by the care of 
King Edward and Archbishop Dunstan, monasteries were 
restored, learning found its former encouragement, and flour- 
ished very much within the walls of the cloisters. So that 
Leland, who was no great friend to the monks, often confesses 
that in those old times there were few or no writers but the 
monks." " Bayle, one of the bitterest enemies the monks ever 



MONASTIC LIFE. 299 

had, is forced to lament the great damage the learned world 
sustained at the dissolution of monasteries."* 

We have before alluded to the ambition and rapaciousness 
of Henry the Eighth and his nobles, who, coveting the reven- 
ues of these institutions, destroyed instead of reforming them ; 
and now, in these our days of the nineteenth century, with the 
vast increase of population, and consequent necessity of more 
churches and ministers, the church truly needs the redemp- 
tion of her alienated property. 

That prejudice has run out to its very utmost tetlier against 
the monks, must be allowed. Doubtless, great abuses crept 
in among them, but as doubtless also, their uses were vast, f 
Multitudes were converted, and continued in the Christian 
faith, by their exertions. The various arts of poetry, physic, 
and painting, as well as architecture in all its glory, were 
fostered by them. For the learning which we of the present 
time now enjoy, we are indebted greatly to them. For, in 
barbarous times, nowhere but in the libraries of the monks 
did the manuscripts of the Grecian and Roman authors find 
protection. Knowledge and science were contraband in the 
baronial hall. Agriculture owns them as its patrons to a 
vast extent. And what would the accuracy of Rapin, the 
penetration of Hume, or the genius of Lyttelton, have avail- 
ed them in their historical labors, if monkish records had not 
been at hand ? See the labors alone of the venerable Bede, 
his commentaries, his treatises, his religious biographies, his 
works on general history and chronology ; above all, his 

* In every great abbey there was a large room called the Scripto- 
rium, to which belonged several writers, whose whole business it was 
to transcribe good books for the use of the public library of the house. 
We have now proofs of their vast industry and ingenuity. 

t The monks long previous to the statute of Charles the Second, for 
the abolition of tenure in villeinage, had procured the manumission of 
this kind of slaves ; for in Blackstone we read of Sir Thomas Smith's 
testimony, that " the holy fathers, monks, and friars, had in their con- 
fessions, and especially in their extreme and deadly sickness, convinced 
the laity how dangerous a thing it ivas for one Christian inan to hold 
another in bondage : so that temporal men, by little and little, by reason 
of that terror in their consciences, were glad to manumit all their vil- 
leins."' — Commentaries o^n the Laws of England., book ii. chap. 6, edit. 
4to, 1766. 



300 MONASTIC LIFE. 

Ecclesiastical History of nearly two centuries and a half of a 
period' the most important ; and though we may not feel in- 
clined to go so far as Macaulay in his assertion,* that "it is 
difficult to say whether England owes more to the Roman 
Catholic rehgion or to the Reformation :" yet with him, 
viewing the power of the priests as mental, and the priests 
themselves by far the wisest portion of society, we may agree, 
" tliat it was on the whole good that they should be respect- 
ed and obeyed, and that their dominion in the Dark Ages 
had been, in spite of many abuses, a legitimate and a salutary 
guardianship." " Then they exercised a power which " natu- 
rally and properly," as says Macaulay, " belongs to intellect- 
ual superiority," and their influence was a real blessing to " a 
society sunk in ignorance, and ruled by mere physical force ;" 
but let it not for a moment be supposed, that we would seek 
at all to advocate the predominance of the sacerdotal over the 
civil power, in the present time, when superiority of intellect, 
or extent and profoundness of learning, in sciences theological 
and secular alike, reside with no peculiar body of sacred men, 
but are shared equally by all. No, in these pages, the imion 
of the state with the church has been supported, which at 
once overthrows all idea of priestly or any other dominion, 
but that which is popular ; and it may be held, that in Rome 
itself, the greatest blessing will be a representative form of 
government, similar, in great degree, to that which England 
enjoys with so much honor and moral integrity — certainly it 
will be well that the Pope and cardinals no longer ai'rogate 
to themselves the government of the Papal states.! 

* Vol. i. p. 49. Macaulay's History of England. 

t Johnson, in his tragedy of "Irene," has this passage 

" Abdalla. 
" Then seize fair Italy's delightful coast. 
To fix your standard in imperial Rome. 

" Mohammed. 
" Her sons malicious clemency shall spare, 
To form new legends, sanctify new crimes, 
To canonize the slaves of superstition, 
And fill the world with follies and impostures, 
'Till angry Heaven shall mark them out for ruin, 
And war o'erwhelm them in their dream of vice. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 301 

Notwithstanding abuses of the system, and they were 
many, we must give, in fairness, all honor to the benefits 
derived from the estabUshment of monasteries, in ages when 
learned men could only exist, and carry on their pursuits, un- 
der the protection and advantage of association. In his own 
" Journey" Dr. Johnson says, " It has been, for many years, 
popular to talk of the lazy devotion of the Romish clergy ; 
over the sleepy laziness of men that erected churches, we may 
indulge our superiority tvith a neio triumph by comparing 
it tvith the fervid activity of those toho suffer them to fall." 

And mark the decay of religion with the fall of the mon- 
astery, lona, once the abode of sanctity, is now left to the 
fruitfulness of its earth alone. " The inhabitaiats," observes 
Dr. Johnson, " are remarkably gross, and remarkably neg- 
lected ; I know not if they are visited hj any minister. The 
island, which was once the metropolis of learning and piety, 
has noio no school for education, nor temple for ivorship, only 
two inhabitants that can speak English, and not one that can 
write or read.'' 

Both Mr. Boswell and himself were much affected at view- 
ing the ruins of lona, and he parted from the painful sight, 
with the consolation, that " perhaps, in the revolutions of the 
world, lona may be some time again the instructress of the 
western regions." 

Of Icolmkill, this extract from the " Journey" must be 
given. Speaking of the illustrious island, once the luminary 
of Scotland, bestowing the light of knowledge and religion on 
a savage and roving people, where to abstract the mind from 
all local emotion would be impossible, and to endeavor to do 
so, if possible, were foolish, he writes, " Whatever withdraws 

could her fabled saints and boasted prayers 

Call forth her ancient heroes to the field, 

How should I joy, 'midst the fierce shock of nations, 

To cross the tow'rings of an equal soul, 

And bid the master genius rule the world." — Act iv. Sc. 2. 

In the year 1849 "war has o'erwhelmed" a portion of them "in 
their dream of vice;" and another portion have emulated "her ancient; 
heroes ;" but as yet the infidel power, the Antichrist that denieth the 
Father and the Son (hence not Mohammedan^ has not appeared. 



302 MONASTIC LIFE. 

us from the power of our senses, whatever makes tne past, the 
distant, or the future predominate over the present, advances 
us in the dignity of thinking beings. Far from me and my 
friends be such frigid philosophy as may conduct us indiffer- 
ent and unmoved over any ground which has been dignified 
by wisdom, bravery, or virtue. That man is Httle to be en- 
vied, whose patriotism would not gain force upon the plain 
of Marathon, or tvhose jnety would not grow warmer among 
the ruins of lona.''* 

Monasteries can hardly be said to be needed in the present 
age, when we consider the large, though still inadequate, 
staff of pastoral clergy. Neither can nunneries be wanted, 
although many persons think that our Protestant church 
does not sufficiently shelter and solace the afflicted and lone- 
ly ones in the world, who might by associating together under 
certain rules, comfort one another in their pilgrimage, and be 
the means of edifying others. Of course the system of vows 
must be at an end, and young persons must not be shut out 
from natural scenes and delights ; as Wordsworth says, 

" It was a breezy hour of eve : 

And pinnacle and spire 
Quiver'd and seem'd almost to heave, 

Clothed with innocuous fire ; 
But, where we stood, the setting sun 

Show'd little of his state : 
And, if the glory reached the nun, 

^Twas through an iron grated 

What do these last two lines not convey to our minds ! 
No, we want Protestant Sisters of Mercy and Charity, living 
in their own homes, but going about doing good in these 
troubled yet hopeful times ; persons of laborious piety, high- 

* Hannah More, with lesser degree of zeal, says of a voyage down 
the Wye, " We deplored the ruthless hand of war, which had dis- 
mantled castles ; and we contemplated abbeys, which the mouldering 
hand of time would have mellowed into more affecting beauty, had the 
zeal of reformation confined itself to opinions and principles, and not 
vented its undistinguishing fury on stone walls, and pillars, and win- 
dows." 

In the preface to Izaak Walton's " Complete Angler," we have an 
account of the religious establishment of Mr. Nicholas Farrer, at Little 
Gidding, near Huntingdon ; and such system could hardly be found 
fault with. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 303 

minded zeal, and self-denying devotion. We want, as it has 
been well hinted, witnesses every where, in every calling, in 
every grade ; we want the good leaven, not retreating and 
hiding within sacred walls, but pervading all society, and 
giving to all its Christian tone. We want Christian duch- 
esses. Christian gentlewomen. Christian officers, Christian 
lawyers, living in their own appointed and natural sphere, 
acting upon the bodies among whom they naturally move, 
and continuing in their position, as though they felt it to be 
providential, and had there to adorn the doctrine of God their 
Saviour.* These we want every where, not ladies who con- 
descend to go among the poor, and talk in a fine way, but 
such as Mrs. Godolphin,t one of the noblest daughters of the 
English church, whose interior piety was profound, and her 
religious works unbounded. Goodness and righteous zeal, 
indeed, was to be expected from one, who could in gentleness 
and humility say, " Before I speake. Lord assist me : when I 
pray, Lord heare me ; when I am praised, God humble me; 
may the clock, the candle, every thing I see, instruct me : 
Lord, cleanse my hands, lett my feete tread thy pathes." 
Thus we find her spending much of her time in " workeing 
for poore people," " spending much of her tyme, and no little of 
her money, in relieving, visiting, and enquireing of them out." 
What an example in her for all district visitors I "I have 
already told," says Evelyn, " how diligently she would en- 
quire out the poore and miserable, even in hospitals, humble 
cells, and cottages, while I have often accompanyed her, as 
farr as the very skirts and obscure places of the towne, 
among whom she not only gave liberall almes, but physitians 
and physick, she would send to some, yea, and administer reme- 
dyes herselfe, and the meanest offices. She would sit, and read, 
and instruct, and pray whole afternoones, and tooke care for 
their spiritual reliefe by procureing a minister of religion to 
prepare them for the Holy Sacrament, for which purpose she 
not only carry'd and gaue them bookes of salvation and de- 
votion, but had herselfe collected diverse psalmes and chap- 

* English Review, No. 16. 

t See the Life of Mrs. Godolphin, by John Evelyn, edited by the 
Bishop of Oxford. Pickering. 



S04 MONASTIC LIFE. 

ters proper to be read and used upon such occasions. Nor 
was home neglected, for of her servants it is said, 'she pro- 
vided them bookes to read, prayers to use by themselves, and 
con.stantly instructed them herselfe in the principles of re- 
ligion : tooke care for their due receiveing of the Holy Sacra- 
ment.' " Let women saintly and devoted as this blessed one 
abound in society, and much more the welfare of the poor 
and the uninstructed would be consulted, than by any en- 
couragement of the cell, the cloister, and the vail. 

Dr. Johnson spoke of the administration of the Sacrament 
of the Lord's Supper in one kind only, and said, " They may 
think, in what is merely ritual, deviations from the primitive 
mode may be admitted on the ground of convenience." We 
should bear in mind, however, that this sacrament is not 
merely ritual ; and that the Church of Rome regards not 
the giving the bread only to the laity as any deviation from 
the primitive mode, for they argue,* that although our blessed 
Lord said. Unless ye shall eat the flesh of the Soti of Man, 
and drink his blood, ye sliall have no life in you. He also 
said. If any one shall eat of this bread, he shall live for 
ever : and also that the converts of Jerusalem were jjerse- 
vering in the doctrine of the Apostles, and in breaking of 
bread, and in prayer (Acts ii. 42), also on the first day of 
the week we loere assembled to break bread. (Acts xx. 7.) 
Thus they deem that they have Scriptural, and hence primi- 
tive authority for administering the Holy Sacrament in one 
kind only. But this " breaking of bread" was not the ad- 
ministration of the Eucharist, but simply a common partici- 
pation of meals, taken in charitable communion and religious 
thankfulness, and followed by prayer.f 

He said, " No reasoning Papist believes every article of 
their faith ;" and after observing, that a good man of a tim- 
orous and credulous disposition, might be glad to be of a 
church where there are so many helps to get to heaven, he 
exclaimed, "I would be a Papist if I could. I have fear 
enouo^h : but an obstinate rationality prevents me. I shall 
never be a Papist, unless on the near approach of death, of 

* Seo Council of Trent, Sess. 21, c. 1. 
t See Blomfield on Acts ii. 42. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 305 

which I have a very great terror ! I wonder that women 
are not all Papists." 

BoswELL. — "They are not more afraid of death than men 
are." 

Johnson. — " Because they are less wicked." 

Dr. Adams. — " They are more pious." 

Johnson. — " No, hang 'em they are not more pious. A 
wicked fellow is the most pious when he takes to it. He'll 
beat you all at piety." 

On the same principle, one would suppose, that, as has 
been said, reformed rakes make the best husbands. Beware 
of that reed. 

In the above conversation the substantial character of Dr. 
Johnson is apparent. He could not be blindly led. " An 
obstinate rationality prevents me ;" or, in better words, a 
capacity for profound reasoning prevents my assent to a system 
which is not true. Herein was the bar to his ever becoming 
a Roman Catholic. Yet, because he would argue reason- 
ably, not regarding the Church of Rome, with enthusi- 
asts, as antichrist ; and because his benevolent disposition 
never faltered toward Roman Catholics ; therefore some 
would rashly conclude that he was too favorable to the 
Roman Catholic religion. He himself said, that old Mr. 
Langton, though a man of considerable learning, had so 
little allowance to make for his " laxity of talk, that becaVise 
in course of discussion he sometimes mentioned what might be 
said in favor of the peculiar tenets of the Romish Church, he 
went to his grave believing him to be of that communion." 

His " laxity of talk" sometimes took a contrary part. 
Boswell makes a record of an evening when he expressed 
himself strcuigly against the Roman Catholics, observing, '< In 
every thing in which they differ from us, they are wrong." 

On another occasion, when it was suggested that monu- 
ments should be erected in St. Paul's church to eminent in- 
dividuals, and somebody proposed that the first should be to 
Pope, he said, " Why, sir, as Pope was a Roman Catholic, 
I would not have his to be first. I think Milton's should 
rather have the precedence." 

Lady Knight says, after stating that his political principles 



306 MONASTIC LIFE. 

ran high in church and state, " I know he disliked absolute 
power : and I am very sure of his disapprobation of the doc- 
trines of the church of Rome ;" and she states that about 
three weeks before they set out for Rome, he said to her 
daughter, " You are going where the ostentatious pomp of 
church ceremonies attracts the imagination ; but if they 
want to persuade you to change, you must remember, that by 
increasing your faith, you may be persuaded to become Turk." 

To Mr. Barnard, who was going to Rome, he wrote a 
long letter, giving him sundry advice and caution, but con- 
cludes with what he considers the most important lesson of 
all. " You are going, he writes, " into a part of the world 
divided, as it is said, between bigotry and atheism: such 
representations are always hyperbolical, but there is certainly 
enough of both to alarm any mind solicitous for piety and 
truth : let not the contempt of superstition precipitate you 
into infidelity, or the horror of infidelity, ensnare you in 
superstition." 

He was always kind to individuals. Toward Romanist 
as also Protestant priests he would ever havefelt, that "ma- 
levolence to the clergy is seldon at a great distance from 
irreverence of religion."* Though he has spoken against 
conversion from the Church of Rome, yet his kindness to- 
ward the Rev. Mr. Compton, one of the English Benedic- 
tine monks at Paris, was very great, after this priest had 
renounced the errors of the Church of Rome, which he was 
led on to do from perusal of the article in the " Rambler"! 
on repentance. He kept him at his house in London, support- 
ed him for upward of a year, and caused him to be intro- 
duced to the Bishop of London, also writing on his behalf 
to other parties \ by which means he obtained preferment. 

Dr. Johnson was told of a Mr. Chamberlayne, who gave 
lip great prospects, and went over to the Church of Pwome. 
He, who warmly admired every man who acted from a con- 
scientious regard to principle, erroneous or not, exclaimed, 
fervently, " God bless him I" 

Let us look faithfully into Dr. Johnson's religious conver- 
sation, and religious character, and we can not fail to agree 
* Life of Dryden. t No. 110. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 307 

with Mrs. Piozzi, who says, " Though beloved by all his 
E-oman Catholic acquaintance, yet was he a most unsliaken 
Church of England man." He was liberal and charitable 
to Roman Catholics, because he could see that they belonged 
to a fundamentally Christian, though corrupted church. He 
would therefore seek to win, rather than scold. He could 
not hold, with Bishop Newton, Mede, Benson, &c., that the 
Church of Rome was antichrist, but rather took the enlarged 
view of Horsley, Jones of Nayland, and our celebrated modern 
divines. Burton, Palmer, Arnold, Todd, Mill, Lee, and others 
of learned and investigating minds. And when once we can 
get what Arnold called "this nonsense, and more than non- 
sense" out of our heads, our hearts will naturally become 
more conciliatory aiad loving. Still, although the Pvoman 
Catholics must be aware that the charges heaped against 
them on this score are mere calumny and misrepresentation, 
yet, though conscious of innocence, such treatment, so often 
repeated, is difficult to bear. " If a man," said Boswell, in 
allusion to another circumstance, " endeavors to convince me 
that my wife, whom I love very much, and in whom I place 
great confidence, is a disagreeable woman, and is even un- 
faithful to me, I shall be very angry, for he is putting me in 
fear of being unhappy." 

Murray. — "But, sir, truth will always bear an examina- 
tion." Johnson. — " Yes, sir, but it is painful to he forced 
to defend it. Consider, sir, how should you like, though con- 
scious of your iimocence, to be tried before a jury for a capital 
crime, once a week." 

, We often see coarse and unscrupulous means of exciting' 
the prejudices of the vulgar resorted to : and we have instances 
also of amiable minds being led thereby into acts of perse- 
cution. In Lord Hardwick's time, the idle reports that the 
tartaned and papistical Highlanders ate young children for 
supper, and that the butchers would be ruined hy the observ- 
ance of Lent, efiiected more with the mob than the deter- 
mined speech he wrote for the king.* When Garrick engaged 
with Mr. Noverre to exhibit the Chinese Festival,! the pie- 

* George the Second. Campbell's Lives of the Chancellors, voL 
V. p. 100. t Life of Garrick, vol. i. p. 180. 



308 MONASTIC LIFE. 

judice of the people was so strong against Frenchmen and 
Papists, that, notwithstanding the royal command, and even 
the presence of the king, the popular Garrick was forced to 
abandon it, after scenes of riot and bloodshed that will ever 
be memorable in theatrical annals. Let ixs recollect also the 
Gordon riots, serious indeed, although with many of the ruf- 
fians the cry of " No Popery" was interpreted to mean and 
efiect " Much Pillage."* 

"It is not only hard," observes a political writer,! " to dis- 
tinguish between too little and too much, but between the 
good and evil intentions of the difierent Reformers. One 
man calls out ' Fire ' that he may save the house, another, 
that he may run away with the furniture." 

The same also says, " Whether men come honestly by 
their opinions or not, it is more advisable to refute than to 
burn, or even to scorch them." Dr. Johnson was of the 
same opinion. When standing on the ruins of the cathedral 
of St. Andrew's, he said, "Knox had set on a mob without 
knowing where it would end : and that differing from a man 
in doctrine was no reason why you should pull his house about 
his ears." Lord Halifax,^ a statesman of great genius and 
capacious views in the time of William the Third, who dis- 
liked the bigotry of Churchman or Puritan, was always unable 
to comprehend how any man should object to saints' days and 
surplices, and how any man should persecute any other man 
for objecting to them. How charitably Jeremy Taylor says,^ 
" Because that a thing is not true, is not argument suf- 
ficient to conclude that he that believes it true is not to be 
endured." 

Dr. Johnson's "poor Jack" II is hourly disturbed by the 
dread of Popery. Among other wild wanderings and wishes, 
he is rejoiced at the admission of Jews to the English privi- 
leges, because he thought a Jeio ivould never he a Pajnst. 

Poor Hannah More, when she wrote against Dissent, was 

* See England under the Hou.se of Hanover, by T. Wright, Esq. 
M.A. F.S.A. t Richard Sharp, 

X See Macaulay's account of him, vol. i. p. 242, 243. 
i Liber, of Prophes. p. 355. 
II Jack Sneaker, in the Idler, vol. i. No. 10. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 303 

accused of favoring Popery, and the old Popish massacres. 
Her very kindness was abused. One pamphlet " accused 
me" she says, " of opposing God's vengeance against Popery, 
by my wickedly wishing that the French priests should not 
be starved, when it was God's will that they should I " This 
good Protestant could rather say, " For my own part, reading 
as I almost every day do, a portion of Nicole, or some other 
good Jansenist, I can not but conceive heaven open to the 
conscientious Papist." " Nay, in that part of religion which 
comes under the name of devotion, ive on our side should 
probably be at a loss to produce instances as numerous " (of 
sublime piety) " and as elevated as the Romish :" partly to 
be accounted for, she thinks, by their secluded habits and 
monastic lives, although she thought rightly, that we are not 
so much required to live out of the world as to live above it. 
She liked Protestantism best in its connection with the char- 
acter and discipline of the Church of England, for she never 
could live in unison with those eager men who were for re- 
forming reformation, and measuring religious advancement by 
the length of its departure from the practice of the Papal 
church." 

Do we not here view, however differing in other respects, 
the very mind in her of Hooker and Dr. Johnson ? all three 
agreeing with Jeremy Taylor, " There is nothing in the 
foundation of faith that can reasonably hinder them (Roman- 
ists) to be permitted ; the foundation of faith stands secure 
enough for all their vain and unhandsome superstructures." 
It is against these latter that we can best, as well as most 
conscientiously contend. 

" Three hundred years ago," says Peter Plymley * to his 
reverend brother Abraham, " men burnt and hanged each 
other for their opinions ; time has softened Catholic as well as 
Protestant ; they both required each ; though each perceives 
only his own improvement, and is blind to that of the other. 
We are all the creatures of circumstances. I know not a 
kinder and better man than yourself; but you, if you had 
lived in those times, would certainly have roasted your Cath- 

* Sidney Smith : Pamphlet, 11th edit. p. 17. 



310 MONASTIC LIFE. 

olicy Alas I too many in the present time use language, 
which, if reduced to practice, would lead to the adoption of 
this art of human cookery. 

A kindred mind,* in all but its facetiousness, said, " I wish 
very much to see before my death an image of a primitive 
Christian church. With little improvement, I think the 
Roman Catholic church of Ireland very capable of exhibiting 
that state of things." I can not think so. Would not the 
poor Episcopal church of Scotland be nearer the primitive 
pattern ? He also said, " I think that a Catholic is a member 
of Christ's church just as much as I am, and I could well 
endure one form of that church in England and another in 
Ireland." 

Although we may see the minds of high churchmen and 
liberals united on a certain point, we must not be led away 
with the idea that any real union of thinking exists between 
them generally. Dr. Johnson and Dr. Arnold — the anti- 
podes I The former was always looking up to higher devoted- 
ness, higher disciplme. Laud and his few, not Knox and his 
rabble ; the latter was ever casting his eye of love abroad, 
thinking how to unite all, not favoring the Roman Catholic 
and taunting the Presbyterian, but imagining how he could 
bid them both shake hands ; both regard only the handsome 
features in each other's countenances ; both consent to the 
vesper chant and Puritan hymn under one and the same roof. 
How much of the former's religion we behold in his lines : 

" See, when the vulgar 'scapes, despised or awed, 
RebelUon's vengeful talons seize on Laud. 
From meaner minds, though smaller fines content, 
The plundered palace, or sequester'd rent ; 
Mark'd out by dangerous parts, he meets the shock. 
And fatal learning leads him to the block ; 
Around his tomb let Art and Genius weep, 
But hear his death, ye blockheads, hear and sleep. 

and how much of the natural and fresh piety of the latter, in 
his admiration f of the lines of the Baron Von Canitz : 

* A Fragment on the Church, by Thomas Arnold, D.D. 1844. 
t See Notes to '• Christian Life, its Course, its Hindrances, and its 
Helps," by Thomas Arnold, D.D. 



MONASTIC LIFE. 311 

" Only God's free gifts abuse not, 
His light refuse not, 
But still His Spirit's voice obey : 
Soon shall joy thy brow be wreathing, 
Splendor breathing 
Fairer than the fairest day. 
" If aught of care this morn oppress the. 
To Him address thee, 
Who, like the sun, is good to all : 
He gilds the mountain-tops, the while 
His gracious smile 
Will on the humblest valley fall." 

He loved to view religion every where ; all places should be 
sacred. And though he disliked the idea of a priesthood, 
and could not bear to view " Christian religion profaned by 
antichristian fables ; Christian holiness marred by supersti- 
tion and uncharitableness ; Christian wisdom and Christian 
sincerity scoffed at, reviled, and persecuted out of sight;" yet 
he thought " that in the Romish system there were many 
good institutions, and practices, and feelings, which it would 
be most desirable to restore among ourselves." He enumer- 
ates them as " daily church services ; frequent communions; 
memorials of our Christian calling continually presented to 
our notice, in crosses and wayside oratories ; commemora- 
tions of holy men of all times and countries ; the doctrine 
of the communion of saints practically taught; religious 
orders, especially of women, of different kinds, and under dif- 
ferent rules, delivered only from the snare and sin of perpet- 
ual vows * — all these, most of which are of some efficacy for 
good, even in a corrupt church, belong no less to the true 
church, ajid ivoidd there be purely beneficial." ^ 

Yes, these would be reforms, apart from the Pope and the 
domination of a priesthood, especially if the whole body of 
the clergy countenanced them. Arnold recognized the doc- 
trine of the crown's supremacy, as " a rare and mere bless- 
ing of God," and there is no prospect of this blessing becom- 
ing void. But the clergy cry out against such things as are 
here recommended, as leanings to Popery, so perpetually is 
Protestantism bugbeared by her own confession of weakness. 

* Introduction to the " Christian Life," &c., p. 56. 

t See again Preface to Izaak Walton's Angler : vows not permitted. 



312 MONASTIC LIFL:. 

Why can not she do the thing that is right, without fear of 
her people deserting her ? There is something very pusil- 
lanimous and pettish in this harassing fear of the attraction 
of Popery. Let it be our constant aim to oppose the estab- 
lishment of the Roman Catholic religion in this country : let 
lis prove that the supremacy of the Pope and many of the 
Popish doctrines are without warrant from Holy Scripture ; 
but never let us cease to elevate the devoutness of Protest- 
antism, to place her in a primitive position, and by rejecting 
not the foundation points, but the novel superstructures of 
the Romanist belief, ever seek to show that the Church of 
England is a true branch of the Catholic church of Chris- 
tianity. Dr. Johnson took the same line as afterward pro- 
posed by Dr. Arnold ; both argued against the errors of the 
Romanist doctrine, both spoke in favor of the Romanist 
devotional practice. This may not be popular, for, as 
Leigh Hunt tells us of Henry the Eighth's time, " the monk 
then ceased to walk, and the gallant London apprentice be- 
came more riotous," so in the present day does this riotous- 
ness abound, much to the detriment of staidness of habit, and 
love of daily religion. 

The young and gifted Kirke White, in an excellent let- 
ter to his brother James on the Services of the Church, speak- 
ing of Roman Catholics, thus kindly says : " There was once 
no other religion in the world ; and we can not think that 
church very wicked, which God chose, once, to make the sole 
guardian of his truth. There have been many excellent and 
pious men among the Roman Catholics, even at the time 
their public faith was corrupted." 

Persons who think and write thus are often exposed dur- 
ing their life-time to the taunt of having a leaning toward 
Popery ; and thus they are made miserable, although they 
live and die true Protestants, and never cherished the re- 
motest idea of turning to the Church of Rome. Of course 
the taunt proceeds from illiberal and narrow minds, but still 
it has its pain ; although it betrays more fearfulness of becom- 
ing unsteady in those who make the charge, than in those 
who are its objects. We might give many instances, espe- 
cially in recent time, in proof of liberality toward others being 



MONASTIC LIFE. 313 

quite consistent with the firmest maintenance of our own 
opinions ; but let us choose an elder one, that of the judi- 
cious and modest author of the preface to Dugdale's Monasti- 
con, who says, as though in anticipation of a like charge, "I 
humbly crave leave, before I advance any farther, publicly to 
profess myself to be a sincere, though very unworthy member 
of the Church of England, and that I have as true and hearty 
affection for her interest as perhaps any other person what- 
soever. And yet I can not but here publicly declare, that I 
think it would have been more happy for her, as well as for 
the nation in general, had King Henry the Vlllth, only re- 
formed and not destroyed the abbeys and other religious 
houses. Monastic institution is very ancient, and it had been 
very laudable, had he reduced the manner of worship to the 
primitive form. Popery, as T take it, signifies no more 
than the errors of the Church of Rome ; had he therefore 
put a stop to those errors, he had acted tvisely, and very 
much to the content of all truly good religious men." 

Such men as these, it may be depended on, are the worthi- 
est opponents of the Church of Rome, and most dreaded by 
her ; such men can take up a strong position as members of 
the true Catholic church, and Rome knows well enough, that 
against a firmly compacted phalanx of such men, she can 
reasonably avail nothing, and that nothing can bring back 
power to her again, but some outrageous outbreak and in- 
crease of the sectaries, strong and rude enough to break 
down the bulwarks presented by her ancient, unwearied, and 
well instructed foe, the Church of England. The battle 
must be fought by the divines of the sixteenth and seven- 
teenth centuries, and on their basis alone, if permanence of 
success be desired ; they have stood on ancient ground, 
plucked up the weeds, but retained all the plants of saving 
truth. Presbyterians, Brownists, Independents, as writes 
the Protestant Bramhall, have been Rome's best friends : 
"for certainly they have done you," addressing the Romanist 
M. de la Milletiere, " more service in England than ever you 
could have done for yourselves."* 

* See Bramhall's Works, vol. i. p. 36, of his Answer to M. de la 
Milletiere. 

o 



314 MONASTIC LIFE. 

In these days, as in other times, a man must be prepared 
to endure obliquy, or rather his aim will be exaggerated, 
when he endeavors to maintain what he believes to be the 
truth. " Is it not hard measure," asked Bishop Home,* 
when a presbyter and accused of being a Hutchinsonian, 
" that when a clergyman only preaches the doctrines and 
enforces the duties of Christianity from the Scriptures, his 
character shall be blasted and himself rendered odious by the 
force of a name, which, in such cases, always signifies what 
the imposers please to mean, and the people to hate. There 
are many names of this kind now in vogue. If a man 
preaches Christ, that he is the end of the law, and the full- 
ness of the Gospel : ' You need not mind him, he is a Hutch- 
insonian I' If he mentions the assistance and direction of the 
Holy Spirit, with the necessity of prayer, mortification, and 
the taking up of the Cross : ' Oh, he is a Methodist I' If he 
talks of the divine right of Episcopacy, with a word concern- 
ing the danger of schism : ' Just going over to Popery !' 
And if he preaches obedience to King George : ' You may 
depend upon it, he is a Pretender's man I' " 

This is simply a portion of the imperfection of this lower 
world, and too often seen in men of really religious disposi- 
tion, as though to signify that the heavenly treasure is de- 
posited but in earthen vessels, and that there is consequently 
no perfection on this side the grave. Groivth in grace, 
however, will destroy the accusing spirit in man, for then, as 
Cecil says, "there will be more usefulness, and less noise;' 
more tenderness of conscience, and less scrupulosity : there 
toill be tnore peace, onore humility : when the full corn is in 
the ear, it bends down because it is full." Religion becomes 
too momentous a concern — we make it not a matter of mere 
nickname and wrangling. 

* Jones's Life of Homo, p. 82. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

HIS SUPERSTITION. 

Superstition is a too credulous belief in supernatural 
agencies and visions attendant on weakness of mind ; it is a 
favoring of those secret apprehensions and horrors to which 
mankind are naturally prone. It is yet strange that some 
great minds have been subject to superstition. The ancient 
Greeks and Romans, learned and valiant, were especially so ; 
and many heroic acts were performed, and many attempts 
at such prevented, through the appearance of the entrails of 
the beast * or bird in sacrifice, or by some ridiculous sign or 
manifestation. The effect of giving credence to such things, 
is either to render a man recklessly bold, or to make him 
timid, anxious, and desponding., We know how Alexander 
the Great became an abject victim of superstition. He 
turned the least incident into a sign or a prodigy. " The 
court," says Plutarch,! "swarmed with sacrificers, purifiers, 
and prognosticators ; they were all to be seen exercising their 
talents there. So true is it, that though the disbehef of re- 
ligion, and contempt of things divine, is a great evil ; yet 
superstition is a greater." Plutarch, however, was not 
always of this opinion. He speaks more warily on another 
occasion. $ For, after telling us of the miracles of olden time 
such as that images have often sweated ; that they have 

* When Sylla landed in Italy, he immediately sacrificed : and the 
liver of the victim had the plain impression of a crown of laurel, with 
two strings hanging down. Of course this was a most cheering omen. 

When Alexander was marching toward Babylon, he heard that 
Apollodorus, its governor, had sacrificed, in order to consult the gods 
concerning hira. Alexander sent for Pythagoras to ask him how the 
entrails of the victim appeared. Pythagoras answered, the liver was 
without a head. "A terrible presage, indeed!" said Alexander. 

t Plutarch's Lives, vol. vi. p. 105. 

t Ibid vol. ii. p. 56. 



316 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

been heard to groan ; and that sometimes they have turned 
from their votaries, and shut their eyes ; he says, of the won- 
derful relations of his own times, " But to give entire credit 
to them, or altogether to disbelieve them, is equally danger- 
ous, on account of human weakness. We keep not always 
within the bounds of reason, or are masters of our minds. 
Sometimes we fall into vain superstitions, and sometimes into 
an impious neglect of all religion. It is best to be cautious, 
and avoid extremes." 

But not only in regard to war, but also in forensic mat- 
ters, superstition held her sway. We have only to read the 
charming letters of Pliny, at once to perceive this. A friend 
writes to him to endeavor to put off the hearing of a cause, 
because he has had a dream signifying that he shall not be 
successful. Pliny promises to use his best efforts to do so, as 
he says, 

" For dreams descend from Jove." 

And he tells him,* that, in the mean while, it is very im- 
portant that he should recollect whether his dreams have 
generally represented things as they afterward happened, or 
not ; and he relates a case of his own, in which he won a 
cause pleaded before some of the most considerable lawyers 
of Rome, when his dream had told him that he should 
lose it. 

But he even supported the more cruel fruits of superstition. 
The ancients believed that the ghosts of deceased persons were 
propitiated by the effusion of human blood. Pliny, therefore, 
tells his friend Maximus, that he was perfectly right in prom- 
ising a combat of gladiators to the citizens of Verona, on 
the death of his excellent wife. " What other spectacle," he 
asks,t " could you have exhibited more proper to the occa- 
sion ?" He tells him, that " the magnificent manner in which 
you executed the object of it, is much to your honor ; for a 
greatness of soul is seen in these smaller instances, as well as 
in matters of higher moment ;" and he only regrets that the 
African panthers, largely provided for the purpose, did not 
arrive in time. 

* Pliny's Letters, book i. p. 42. t Book vi. p. 367. 



HIS SUPERSTITIOiN. 317 

He seems to think it an atoning circumstance in tlie life 
of the " har" Regulus, that on the death of his son, he 
caused all the child's favorite little horses, dogs, parrots, 
blackbirds, and nightingales, to be slain around his funeral 
pile. Pliny's story, as related to him, of the haunted house 
at Athens,* is interesting ; and, altogether, we must come to 
the determination that this eloquent, judicious, polite, and 
most amiable man, in common with most men of his age, 
possessed a mind tinctured, in more or less degree, as circum- 
stances guided him, with such superstitious belief as proceeds 
from excess of reverential and tender feelings. 

Not in heathen minds only has the love of superstition 
found a place, but in Christian also. The poetry of Pruden- 
tius shows us at what an early period (a. d. 400) the Cross 
was regarded with a kind of superstitious reverence. In his 
" Hymnus ante Somnum," he writes : 

'' Fac cum, vocante somno, 
Castum petis cubile, 
Frontem, locumque cordis 
Crucis figura signet. 
Crux pellit omne crimen : 
Fugiunt crucem tenebrse ; 

Tali dicata signo, 

Mens fluctuare nescit." 

And we well know how the same measure of superstition still 
attaches to the Cross in the estimation of the Roman Catho- 
lic church ; together with the numberless legends, charms, and 
fables, all ancillary to superstition, which have been invented 
or countenanced by the priests and monks of that church. 
We have merely to read their Lives of the Saints, at once 
to be convinced of this painful and degrading fact. 

And not only among Roman Cathohcs, but with the Puri- 
tans and ultra-Protestants, the grossest delusions have found 
place. Witchcraft was solemnly believed. And so largely 
did this belief prevail among the party mentioned, that it drew 
the following trite censure from a Roman Catholic writer : 
" So great folly did then oppress the miserable world, that 
Christians believed greater absurdities, than could be im- 
posed upon the heathens." Even the good Sir Matthew 
* Book vii. p. 51. 



318 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

Hale, though with doubt and fear, sentenced two women to 
death on a charge of witchcraft ; and the credit of putting 
an end to this delusion belongs in England to Archbishop 
Harsnet, who was raised to the See of York by Charles the 
First, in the year 1628 : at least, we may give him the credit ; 
for although the judgment of Sir Matthew Hale was passed 
after this date, yet the wit and good sense of the archbishop 
really worked the gradual downfall of belief in witchcraft. 

And more than in England, mark the horrible cruelties 
attendant on this absurd belief at Salem (now called Danvers) 
in the United States of America : in which tyrannical and 
hypocritical scenes Dr. Cotton Mather, to his eternal obloquy, 
took so conspicuous a part : and yet the doctor was a man 
actually credited by our own Baxter. During the prevalence 
of this fanaticism, we are told, twenty persons lost their lives 
by the hands of the executioner, fifty-five escaped death by 
confessing themselves guilty, one hundred and fifty were in 
prison, and more than two hundred others accused. * 

And a belief in witches, fairies, and other singular beings, 
is still indulged by the common people. Addison says of our 
forefathers, " There was not a village in England that had 
not a ghost in it, the church-yards were all haunted, every 
large common had a circle of fairies belonging to it, and there 
was scarce a shepherd to be met with who had not seen a 
spirit." And in parts of England, in Ireland, Scotland, and 
the Isle of Man, the existence of witches and fairies, and the 
power of the evil eye, are fully credited. An extraordinary 
instance of this lately happened near the Clee Hill, in the 
county of Salop. A clergyman returning homeward one 
evening saw a wagon stuck fast by the road side. " Well, 
what is the matter ?" " The horses can not stir it," replied 
the farmer, "it's bewitched." "Who has bewitched it?" 
asked the clergyman. " Why, sir, that old woman," naming 
a person known to him. The farmer and his man, when first 
seen, were actually both on their knees, with their coats turn- 

* For an account of this delusion, and Dr. Mather's part in it, see 
"Ecclesiastical Reminiscences of the United States,"' by the Rev. Ed- 
ward Waylen (Straker); a book abounding with interesting matter on 
the American church. 



HIS SUPERSTITION. 310 

ed, in prayer that the spell might be removed, and were just 
about to send a gift to the old lady for that purpose : when, 
on the clergyman walking round the wagon, he found the 
wheel fast in the stump of a tree, the removal of which by 
an ax was his instant advice, and on went the wagon cheer- 
ily enough.* 

Nearly about the same time (1849), a wagoner started 
from a farm-house with wagon and team, when lo and be- 
hold, before he had gone many yards the horses stood stock 
still, and nothing would induce them to stir, no allurements, 

* There is a very good anecdote of a judge, who acquitted two 

women who were brought before him on a charge of "flyin<r in the 

air," on the ground that there was no Act of Parliament to prevent it. 

This of course was done to discourage the belief in witchcraft. It is, 

I think, in the Gloucester Guide Books, for I believe the judge was 

Judge Powell, who lies in the Lady Chapel of Gloucester Cathedral. 

The following handbill was actually exhibited is this century : 

" Sold Here, 

Price Is. 6d. in cloth, 

THE LIFE OF MRS. PALLISTER, 

OF PRESTON, NEAR HULL, 

Who was a consistent Member of the Wesleyan Methodist Connection 

upward of Fifty-six Years ; 

Comprising 

A Faithful Account of the Celestial Phenomena which adorned 

her Shroud and Coffin ; 

Witnessed by Hundreds of Persons residing at Preston, Hedon, and the 

Neighborhood ; and attested by the real Names and Professions of 

respectable Residents. 



In this place in the middle of the placard is a view of this lying 
wonder. A number of persons are assembled to gaze upon the corpse 
in its shroud, on various parts of which are delineated objects like 
stars, throwing out rays in all directions : with a cross of considerable 
size on the breast, seemingly in a blaze of light. Query, Was the 
whole a fabrication of a rascally publisher, or the contrivance of an 
equally rascally hypocrite, who put phosphorus on the shroud 1 
Either way, the speculation serves to show the hold of superstition, 
in ordinary minds, in the 19th century. 



A Faithful Representation of the Wonderful Figures which rested 
upon the Shroud and Corpse of the late Mrs. Pallister, of Preston, near 
Hull, who was translated from Earth to Glory, Feb. 15, 1833, aged 
76 years, and who was a consistent Member of Methodist Connection 
for 57 years. 

From a Sketch taken on the Spot by Mr. F. Hustwick, of Hull. 
London : Joseph Noble, 20, Giltspur-street ; and Market-place, Hull." 



320 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

no thrashings, could move them. The wagoner went back 
to tell his master that the horses were bewitched. The 
master replied, that it was a very bad job. A consultation 
was being held, when in came the boy running and breath- 
less ; he had discovered the cause ; the bottle of drink was 
left behind ! 

Sir Walter Scott says of his country, that such spells are 
still believed in. A lady of property in Mull, a friend of 
his, had a few years since much difficulty in rescuing from 
the superstitious fury of the people, an old woman who used 
a charm to injure her neighbor's cattle. He had it in his 
possession, and it consisted of feathers, parings of nails, hair, 
and such like trash, wrapped in a lump of clay. Persons 
in rural districts in England commonly sell charms for the 
toothache and other pains ; and a clergyman found, on one 
occasion, a young man who was nearly blind, and who prac- 
ticed such things for gain, boiling herbs of all kinds on the 
fire below, while a poor woman was in child-labor in the 
room above, and every mystic syllable of incantation was to 
her mind more efficacious than the pastor's prayer. 

In the Isle of Man this belief is entertained, and a singular 
trial took place in one of the courts lately, wherein the super- 
stitious nature of the minds of some of the natives was largely 
and singularly revealed. There too they credit the existence 
of fairies, malignant and benignant. They have a tradition 
that witches can transform themselves into hares, and such 
hares can only be shot with a silver bullet. On the first of 
May they go out upon the hills in the evening, with great 
shouting and blowing of horns, to scare away the witches out 
of the furze and bushes. They have a prejudice against 
eating hares or eels. A few years ago, a young Englishman 
ordered a hare for dinner. The servant girl entertained the. 
usual Manx horror against such animals. She would not 
even skin it herself The young man, knowing her fears, 
was determined to play a trick. Just before the hare wasj 
served up, he managed to envelope it in some degree with 
spirits of wine. The poor girl brought it in, when on the 
moment of her depositing it on the table a bit of paper was' 
lighted, and the hare suddenly became encompassed with 



Hits SUPERSTITION. 321' 

blue flames I The terror and utter consternation of the poor 
girl may well be imagined. The joke was far too practical ; 
but she afterward confessed that she was justly punished, and 
would never meddle with a hare again I 

"A Manxman," says Robertson,* "amid his lonely mount- 
ains, reclines by some romantic stream, the murmurings of 
which lull him into a pleasing torpor. Half slumbering, he 
sees a variety of imaginary beings which he believes to be 
real. Sometimes they resemble his traditionary ideas of 
fairies, and sometimes they assume the appearance of his 
friends and neighbors. Presuming on these dreams, the 
Manx enthusiast predicts some future event ; and should 
any thing similar occur, he fancies himself endowed with the 
gift of prescience, and thus disturbs his own happiness and 
that of others." The same author, observing on the sombrous 
melancholy produced by solitude on an inert disposition, says, 
" Hence, it seems, there are many who labor under a dis- 
ordered imagination in this island ; and who, from their 
native disposition, giving way to religious terrors, imbibe all 
the gloomy tenets of Methodism." Be this as it may, there 
are many wise, cheerful, enhghtened families on the Isle of 
Man, and its modern Methodism is far removed from that 
ascetic character which once it assumed, although some of 
the elder kind of Methodists may still be found, who, for 
instance, would not eat a morsel of food on a Sacrament 
Sunday, until after they had partaken of the Holy Supper in 
the church. 

But let us come to what may be called Dr. Johnson's 
superstitions. It was his care to go in or out at a door or 
passage, by a certain number of steps from a certain point, 
or at least so that either his right or his left foot (it was not 
known which) should constantly make the first actual move- 
ment when he came close to the door or passage. When 
he had gone wrong, in order to achieve this, he would some- 
times go back again, and measure his distance with more 
care. In walking over a paved quadrangle, he would not 
step on the juncture of the stones, but carefully in the centre ; 

* Tour through the Isle of Man, by David Robertson, Esq., in 1791. 

o* 



322 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

and in walking up an accustomed footway, he would always 
place his hand on the top of the centre posts, and if he 
omitted one, he would go back and amend his omission. 
There is nothing particular to be noticed in this habit ; very 
many persons do the same kind of thing from an orderly, me- 
thodical manner into which they have got, and especially have 
a trick of counting certain numbers, even or uneven, over and 
over again ; or counting trees, animals, furniture in a room, 
&c., until they leave off at a favorite number. It is merely 
a harmless habit, which a little reasoning with one's self 
would soon correct, but which may become annoying by its 
increasing consumption of time. 

On the question, however, concerning ghosts and appari- 
tions, much more must be said ; though Dr. Johnson did not 
positively believe in either. He states fairly the belief of 
the credulous, in his Rasselas. The prince says, "If all 
your fear be of apparitions, I will promise you safety : there 
is no danger from the dead : he that is once buried will be 
seen no more." 

" That the dead are seen no more," replied Tinlac, "I will 
not imdertake to maintain against the concurrent and un- 
varied testimony of all ages, and of all nations. There is 
no people, rude or learned, among whom apparitions of the 
dead are not related and believed." In this saying of Tin- 
lac we must suppose Johnson's opinion to be mainly em- 
bodied, although it may not be correct as applied (nor would 
he probably apply it thus) to all individuals of all nations, for 
it is materially softened by his opinions subsequently delivered. 

For on one occasion, when Mrs. Williams was telling him 
a story of second-sight which had happened in Wales, and 
he had said that he should like to have some instances of 
that faculty well authenticated, he further observed, " that 
we could have no certainty of the truth of supernatural ap- 
pearances, unless something was told us which we could not 
know by ordinary means, or something done which could not 
be done but by supernatural power ; that Pharaoh in reason 
and justice required such evidence from Moses; nay, that 
our Saviour said, ' If I had not done among them the works 
which none other man did, they had not had sin,'" 



HIS SUPERSTITION. 323 

We must bear in mind that Johnson loved an argument, 
and especially aimed to detect its fallacy ; therefore, because 
he sometimes refutes the reasoning of a disbeliever in ghosts, 
we must not rush to the conclusion that he himself believed 
in them. Boswell once said to him, " There is this objection 
made against the truth of ghosts appearing ; that if they are 
in a state of happiness, it would be a punishment to them to 
return to this world ; and if they are in a state of misery, it 
would be giving them a respite." Johnson replied, " Why, 
sir, as the happiness or misery of embodied spirits (he must 
mean disembodied) does not depend upon place, but is intel- 
lectual, we can not say that they are less happy or less mis- 
erable, by appearing upon earth." He might have reminded 
Boswell, that departed spirits have not yet reached their final 
destiny, and thus his idea would be strengthened, that their 
visits to this earth might be so ordered by the Disposer of all 
events, as neither to diminish their happiness or woe. Prob- 
ably this is intimated, although not positively stated. 

Croker is very earnest in his observations against the ap- 
pearances of ghosts, and insists that there is no satisfactory 
evidence of their appearance. Johnson, talking of ghosts, 
said, that he knew one friend, who was an honest and sensi- 
ble man, who told him he had seen a ghost — old Mr. Cave, 
the printer, at St. John's Gate. He said Mr. Cave did not 
like to talk of it, and seemed to be in great horror whenever 
it was mentioned. Boswell asked, " Pray, sir, what did he 
say was the appearance ?" Johnson answered, " Why, sir, 
something of a shadowy being." 

Johnson repeated this at another time, and also Goldsmith 
said, that he was assured by his brother, th» Rev. Mr. Gold- 
smith, that he had seen one. The story of the ghost of the 
notorious Parson Ford having appeared is also related, but cer- 
tainly we have no substantial evidence in either of these cases. 

Of the power of the second-sight some strong instances 
were related to Dr. Johnson. M'Quarrie, an ancient Scot- 
tish chieftain, intelligent, polite, and much a man of the world, 
told him, that he had gone to Edinburgh, and taken a man- 
servant along with him. An old woman who was in the 
house said one day, " M'Quarrie will be at home to-morrow. 



324 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

and will bring two gentlemen with him :" and she said she 
saw his servant return in red and green. He did come home 
next day. He had two gentlemen with him, and his servant 
had a new red and green livery, which M'Quarrie had bought 
for him at Edinburgh, upon a sudden thought, not having 
the least intention when he left home to put his servant in 
livery : so that the old woman could not have heard any 
previous mention of it. 

Johnson had many temptations to believe in ghosts and 
apparitions, and he would, in common with us all, have glad- 
ly done so, but he never could get the requisite evidence, and, 
unlike John Wesley, he must have that clear and undoubted. 
I say, in common with us all, for who would not like the 
privilege of a visit from a departed friend : and who need 
feel terror even from the ghost of a wicked man ? How de- 
spairingly, yet longingly, the poet cries, 

"I look for ghosts : but none will force 
Their way to me — 'tis falsely said, 
That there was ever intercourse 
Between the living and the dead : 
For surely then I should have sight 
Of him I wait for day and night, 
With love and longings infinite !" 

How beautifully doth Crabbe apostrophize : 

" Dear, happy shade ! companion of the good, 
The just, the pure, do I on thee intrude ? 
Art not thou come my spirit to improve, 
To form, instruct, and fit me for thy love : 
And, as in love we parted, to restore 
The blessing lost, and then to part no more?" 

Oh, may we not say, that such a blessing as this would 
serve too mixch to reconcile us to the present life ; for what 
can stimulate more our longing to depart, than, after union 
with Christ, the hope that union with former friends is one 
of the chief happinesses of heaven. No, perhaps we dare 
not go beyond the source of Southey's consolation : 

" Meantime I soothe 
The deep regret of nature, with belief, 
O Edmund ! that thine eye's celestial ken 
Pervades me now, marking with no mean joy. 
The movements of a heart that loved thee well." 



HIS SUPERSTITION. 325 

Let us only assure ourselves of this belief, this union and 
sympathy of departed ones, and how much alleviation of in- 
tensest sorrow is gained. 

Johnson, we say, had temptations to believe in ghosts and 
apparitions ; first from the seeming authenticity of some 
stories related to him : secondly, from the belief of other per- 
sons, especially of Boswell, who said of Johnson, " He is only 
willing to believe ; I do believe : and thirdly, from the de- 
sire of his own mind, accustomed as it was to hold in constant 
view the Christian doctrines connected with supernatural 
belief. Thus, of apparitions he observed, " A total disbelief 
of them is adverse to the opinion of the existence of the said 
betiveen death and the last day ; the question simply is, 
whether departed spirits ever have the power of making them- 
selves perceptible to us : a man who thinks he has seen an 
apparition can only be convinced himself; his authority will 
not convince another : and his conviction, if rational, must 
be founded on being told something which can not be known 
but by supernatural means." 

When Lord Lyttelton's vision, the prediction of the time 
of his death, with its exact fulfillment, was mentioned, he 
said, "It is the most extraordinary thing that has happened 
in my day. I heard it with my own ears, from his uncle. 
Lord Westcote. I am so glad to have every evidence of the 
spiritual world, that I am ivilling to believe it." * 

Here we have the main reason for his minute and constant 
inquiries into the evidence for the appearance of ghosts, and 
for the authenticity of the second-sight in Scotland. Yet 

* Johnson, in his Life of the Earl of Roscommon, after relating how 
the earl, when a boy, in the middle of his play at Caen, in Normandy, 
cried out, " My father is dead," and his words proved to be true : says, 
" Here is the relation of a fact given by a man (Mr. Knolles) who had 
no interest to deceive, and who could not be deceived himself; and 
here is, on the other hand, a miracle which produces no effect. The 
order of nature is interrupted to discover not a future, but only a dis- 
tant event, the knowledge of which is of no use to him to whom it is 
revealed. Between these difficulties what way shall be found? Is 
reason or testimony to be rejected ? I believe what Osborne says of 
an appearance of sanctity may be applied to such impulses or anticipa- 
tions as this : Do not wholly slight them, because they may be true ; but do 
not easily tru^t them, because they may be false.'''' 



326 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

what was the result ? With all the willingness to believe, 
he never could obtain sufficient evidence. After visiting a 
people remarkable for their implicit belief in these things, 
and with many instances adduced before him, he still says,* 
as the end of his Scottish inquiries, " Strong reasons for 
incredulity will readily occur. This faculty of seeing things 
out of sight is local, and commonly useless. It is a breach 
of the common order of things, without any visible reason, 
or perceptible benefit. It is ascribed only to a people very 
little enlightened : and among them, for the most part, to the 
mean and ignorant." Again, " There is against it, the 
seeming analogy of things confusedly seen, and little under- 
stood : and for it, the indistinct cry of national persuasion, 
which may be perhaps resolved at last into prejudice and 
tradition. / never could advance my curio?,iiy to conviction : 
but came aivay at last only xvilliyxg to believe.''' This, be 
it recollected, is not Boswell's reporting ; these words are 
from his own Journal ; and therefore, the idle charge of 
superstition, as it has been advanced against him, is totally 
unfounded. Had he ever been inclined to superstition, then 
was the time for its indulgence. 

In this same " Journal," he also says, that the boatmen 
expected no good event of one of his voyages, for one of them 
declared he heard the cry of an English ghost. " This omen 
I was not told till after our return, and therefore can not 
claim the degnity of despising it.'' 

His language in England always was directed to the effect 
that the matter was undecided. When talking of Wesley's 
credulity about the Newcastle ghost, he said, " Charles, who 
is a more stationary man, does not believe the story. I am 
sorry that John did not take more pains to inquire into the 
evidence for it." Miss Seward (with an incredulous smile) : 
" What, sir I about a ghost ?" " Yes, madam," replied 
JoHN.soN ; " this is a question which after five thousand years 
is yet undecided ; a question, whether in theology or philoso- 
phy, one of the most important that can come before the 
human understanding." It is important, inasmuch as men 
would have ocular demonstration of the truth of a future life ; 
* In his own Journal, p. 252. 



HIS SUPERSTITION. 327 

but we are assured that we have sufficient evidence, without 
a fulfillment of the rich man's request to Abraham. John- 
son never could bear flippancy of either thought or speech ; 
sometimes he liked to establish a paradox ; at all events he 
would magnify the importance of a matter before one who 
seemed willing to dismiss it as unworthy of any investigation 
or reflection at all. At another time he repeated nearly the 
same words, with this addition, " All argument is against it," 
against the appearance of the spirit of any person after death 
— " but all belief is for it." 

He expressed great indignation at the imposture of the Cock- 
lane ghost, and related, with much satisfaction, how he had 
assisted in the detection of the cheat, in which Dr. Douglas, 
the Bishop of Salisbury, and great detector of impostures, 
aided him. He was very angry also with Lord Kames, for 
misrepresenting Clarendon's account of the appearance of Sir 
George Villiers's ghost, as if Clarendon were weakly credu- 
lous ; when the fact is, that Clarendon only says that the 
story was upon a better foundation of credit than usually such 
discourses are founded upon. 
sf Another conversation discloses Dr. Johnson's caution. 
^Vhen speaking of belief in ghosts, he said, " Sir, I make a 
distinction between what a man may experience by the mere 
strength of his imagination, and ivhat imaghiation can 'not 
jwssibly produce. Thus, suppose I should think that I saw 
a form, and heard a voice cry, ' Johnson, you are a very 
wicked fellow, and unless you repent you will certainly be 
punished ;' my own un worthiness is so deeply impressed upon 
my mind, that I might imagine I thus saw and heard, and 
therefore I should not believe that an external communication 
Jiad been m,ade to me. But if a form should appear, and a 
voice should tell me that a particular man had died at a 
particular place and a particular hour, a fact which I had 
no apprehension of, nor any means of knowing, and this fact, 
with all its circumstances, should afterward be unquestionably 
proved, I should in that case be persuaded that I had super- 
natural intelligence imparted to me." -^ 

Dr. Johnson draws a right distinction here. Physicians 
will tell us how much the theory of apparitions, spectral 



328 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

illusions, and supernatural voices, depends upon a disordered 
imagination, in which things past are confounded with those 
that are present. " A person of vivid conception," says Dr. 
George Moore,* " may pei'suade himself out of his senses, 
merely because his mind is too intently occupied to allow 
him properly to employ them. Distinct perception requires 
attention and the adjustment of the organs of sense; but the 
mind that is too active can not attend. Of course therefore 
the faculty of comparison is so far suspended ; and as by this 
faculty we distinguish ideas from realities, and object from 
object, a thing imagined onust, under these circumstances, 
have all the force of a reality. Poets and lunatics respect- 
ively exemplify this remark. An imagination that deludes 
us by the strength of remembered impressions is poetical, 
when transient and manageable, but when uncontrollable 
and permanent, it is madness." 

We know well enough that our minds, by an act of vol- 
untary recollection, can set before us the appearance in face 
and form, and dress, of those who are absent ; and some- 
times this appearance reproduced by the mind will so ob- 
trude itself on the bodily sense, as to make us actually be-' 
hold the recollected person as though walking, as it were, by 
our side. Then we think we see an apparition, although 
such appearance is created only by disorder of the mind, 
which suspends the power of the senses. Dr. Hibbert men- 
tions the case of a gentleman, who, having been told of the 
sudden death of a friend, saw him distinctly when he walked 
out in the evening. He was not in his usual dress, but in a 
coat of a different color, which he had left off wearing for 
some months. His friend could even remark a figured vest 
which he had worn about the same time, also a colored silk 
handkerchief around his neck, in which he had used to see 
him in the morning. Thus he beheld him, not dressed, as 
he might have been, at the time of his death, but as he had 
been accustomed to see him months before. And often a 
number of men if strong impressions have been made on their 
minds, and prepossessed their wills, may imagine that they 

* The Power of the Soul over the Body, by George Moorej M.D. 



HIS SUPERSTITION. 329 

together behold the form of a departed one. A whole ship's 
crew were thrown into consternation by the ghost of the cook 
who had died a few days before. He was distinctly seen by 
them all, walking on the water with a peculiar gait by 
which he was distinguished, one of his legs being shorter 
than another. The cook, so plainly recognized, was only a 
piece of old wreck. * 

* So much influence also has the state of the body over the mind, 
that often physical disease leads to mental wandering. A Fellow of a 
College in Oxford used to be terrified by the appearance of a bloody 
head presented before his eyes. He consulted a physician, by whom 
he was bled : and medicine being administered, he lost sight of the 
spectre for a while. But it returned ; and at last, the man having 
found out the cause of this appearance, namely, a flow of blood to his 
own head, whenever it occun-ed always resorted to bleeding. As the 
blood departed from his veins, so the image of the bloody head van- 
ished. 

A story may be related here, to show how readily some persons are 
inclined to superstition. In the Life of Mrs. Fletcher, of Madeley (p. 
363), we find the following entry in her journal : " The other day brother 
Tranter preached in my room very profitably, and told us afterward a 
remarkable answer to prayer. Mr. R. Crowther and his wife were 
going to their circuit in a borrowed gig. They came to the house of 
a pious man and woman, accustomed to receive the messengers of 
Jesus Christ. There were some persecuting spirits in the place. In 
the night, the man and his wife found they could not sleep, and said 
one to the other, ' I feel a great weight on my mind, perhaps some hurt 
is doing to the gig.^ They got up and went out. They found one 
wheel was gone. They looked all about, but could not find it. They 
returned into the house, and went to prayers, laying before the Lord the 
difficulty Mr. Crowther would be in. At last one of them said, ' It comes 
to my mind they have carried it to such a place (about two miles off) and 
thrown it into the swamp.' The other said, ' Let us go and see.' 
About one o'clock they set off". When they came to the place, which 
was full of water and mud, and covered with rushes, they looked about, 
but could see nothing of the wheel. They then saw a large stick ; 
upon which the man said, ' Perhaps on this stick they carried it ; let us 
try again.' He then took up the stick and groped in the mud. Pres- 
ently he felt the wheel. They got it out, brought it home, and put it 
on to the gig." 

The above is set off" as a miracle ! but sober persons will see nothing 
in it beyond natural sense and action. The man could not sleep, which 
is often the case after the excitement of preaching, for the brain be- 
comes heated. They knew that persons probably would like to play 
them a trick. The only portion of their property exposed was the gig ; 



330 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

Be not superstitious, but believing. Johnson could not 
argue himself into cognizance of a ghost ; yet he could say- 
that all belief was on its side. Wise and discreet modern 
writers have asserted their belief in the possibility of the ex- 
istence of ghosts and spirits, and their belief has been the 
more firmly grounded because they have known how to 
separate and distinguish the real truth of the matter from 
the countless counterfeits that surround it. " To pull the 
old woman out of our hearts," as Persius expresses it, is 
absolutely necessary in order to substantiate that belief in 
the appearance of ghosts which is consistent with the 
dictates of reason and religion. It is not because an old 
withered oak bough, illumined by the whitening moonbeam, 
has been taken for a ghost, and scared the country people 
from a certain footpath, and then has been found out to be 
only the bough after all, that therefore our faith should be 
turned aside from the real appearance ; or because villages 
have been frightened by a white sheet, therefore the reality 
should cease with the imposture. There may be the real 
thing after all, and in our common belief of religion, we 
credit far harder matters than this. " For my own part," 
writes the wise and cautious Addison, " I am apt to join in 
opinion with those who believe that all the regions of nature 
swarm with spirits ; and that we have multitudes of specta- 
tors in all our actions, when we think ourselves most alone. 
But, instead of terrifying myself with such a notion, I am 
wonderfully pleased to think that I am always engaged with 
such an innumerable society, in searching out the wonders 
of creation, and joining in the same concert of praise and 
adoration." 

Milton has finely described this mixed communion of men 
and spirits in Paradise ; and had, doubtless, his eye upon a 



hence their first thoughts were turned to it. They get xip, and find 
the wheel gone. The well-known swamp is the most probable place 
of its destination. This occurs to them. They find a large stick, the 
very thing suited to carrying off the wheel. On this evidence, they of 
course search the mud and find the wheel. There might be a very 
offensive conceit in calling this a miracle, though, doubtless, it may 
have been the innocent belief of a superstitious mind. 



HIS SUPERSTITION. 331 

verse in old Hesiod, which is almost, word for word, the same 
with his third line in the following passage : 

"Nor think though men were none, 
That Heaven would want spectators, God want praise : 
Milhons of spiritual creatures walk the earth. 
Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep : 
All these with ceaseless praise his works behold, 
Both day and night." 

Now, if spirits of any kind be around us, as we have Scrip- 
tural reason to believe that angels actually are, why shoitld 
not those that have left human bodies be permitted to be 
present ? Angels have been seen on the earth — we see them 
not now; spirits have been recalled from Paradise, and re- 
united to human bodies, though there be no necessity now of 
such miracle : the matter seems to narrow itself into the 
question, simply, ivhether the human eye is alloived at any 
time to behold a spirit ? for we may acknowledge the pos- 
sibility or probability of the presence of departed spirits, and 
yet deny the permission of seeing them. 

A writer of modern date (1814), who has collected a 
number of stories of ghosts and hobgoblins, &c., which he 
proves to be of human fabrication, and the intention of whose 
book is to put weak and superstitious people on their guard, 
makes this serious statement in his Preface : " Though I can- 
didly acknowledge to have received great pleasure in forming 
the collection, I would by no means wish it to be imagined 
that I am skeptical in my opinions, or entirely disbelieve and 
set my face against all apparitional record. No ; I do be- 
lieve that, for certain purposes, and on certain and all-wise 
occasions, such things are, and have been permitted by the 
Almighty; but by no means do I believe they are suffered 
to appear half so frequently as our modern ghost-mongers 
manufacture them." These are the words of an unprejudiced 
mind in the cause ; or if prejudice did exist, it would seem 
to have been such as militated against belief of this super- 
natural exhibition. He says again, in another part of his 
work : " There are some who are ghost-mad, and terrify 
themselves, because the Scripture has mentioned the appear- 
ance of ghosts. I shall not dispute, but, by the power of 



332 HIS SUPERSTITION. 

God, an incorporeal being may be visible to human eyes : 
but then, an all-wise Providence would not have recourse to 
a preternatural efiect but on some important occasion." 

With the knowledge that persons may certainly be de- 
ceived by visions, there is a difficulty in a man's obtaining 
credit for having seen a ghost, let the evidence to himself be 
ever so irrefragable. For this, and other plain reasons, it 
must be very wicked to personate a ghost. It is a solemn 
matter. Job saw a spirit ; there is the account of the witch 
of Endor ; and at our Lord's resurrection, the bodies of saints 
came out of the graves, and their spirits became reunited 
with them. This latter instance is recorded by one Evan- 
gelist only ; but there is no evading it, for it is in all the 
ancient MSS. Whether they remained on earth, or ascend- 
ed with our Lord, and are alluded to as " the just men made 
perfect," is quite immaterial. 
'V Whatever our own opinions may be, it is a " foolish no- 
tion," as Boswell says, to suppose that Johnson was weakly 
credulous on this subject of the appearance of departed spirits. 
Johnson was not superstitious. The article in the " Rambler" 
on Superstition and Religion (No. 44) proves this : for although 
it was not written by Johnson himself, but by Mrs. Carter, 
it met with his high approbation. Mrs. Piozzi says, " The 
papers contributed by Mrs. Carter had much of Johnson's 
esteem, though he always blamed me for preferring the letter, 
signed Chariossa (No. 100), to the allegory (No. 44), where 
religion and superstition are indeed masterly delineated." 
Mrs. Carter was a woman of superior talent, of high church 
principles, and the friend of Hannah Moore. ^ 

The matter may be concluded with the observation, that 
although we may have no sufficient human testimony in the 
affirmative, yet that we have Scriptural proof of the reappear- 
ance of departed spirits on the earth : and no considerate 
man can say, that it may not please God, for some beneficent 
purpose, to exert this power on fitting occasions, again and 
again. 



CHAPTER XX. 

EPITAPHS. 

The writing of Epitaphs is an ancient and a good custom. 
It serves to perpetuate the memory of the departed, to in- 
struct the living, and to fill us with a desire of posthumous 
fame, of at least a local character. Let us cordially agree 
in the sentiment of the Roman poet, 

"Et tumulum facite, et turaulo superaddite carmen." 

"It is hard to make an epitaph," writes Dr. Johnson to 
David Garrick : and when a man tells us of the difficulty 
in doing a thing, or taunts us with the easiness of finding 
fault, we like to see that man putting us in the right way. 
Now, this Dr. Johnson has done; for he has dehberately 
written an Essay on Epitaphs, wherein he finds fault with 
some of this kind of inscriptions, and gives praise to others. 

That the tomb of the good man should somewhat serve to 
supply the want of his presence is, in his view, the first in- 
tention of epitaphs : and those epitaphs are most perfect 
which set virtue in the strongest light. At the same time, 
it is the sort of mediocre class of men whose memories re- 
quire the longest and most studied epitaphs,* while the first- 

* Dr. Watts commemorated Mather'in an epitaph of not less than 
one hundred and eleven lines ! even including " the talhiess of his stat- 
ure" among the good qualities of the deceased. Wesley's epitaph' is 
quite a vain work. Lord Lyttelton, who would have no epitaph on 
his own tombstone, wrote a long one for the monument of Sir James 
Macdonald; and in the 17th and 18th centuries, the epitaphs on divines 
(especially these by Dr. Friend) are noted for their diffusiveness. 
Burke was rather in favor of long epitaphs; for, he said, " every thing- 
short is apt to be general, and as well fitted for one great public man 
as another." 

Dr. Burney tells us, that Johnson said, " The writer of an epitaph 
should not be considered as saying nothing but what is strictly true. 
Allowance must be made for some degree of exaggerated praise." 
His idea of the duties of a biographer may illustrate what he means. 



334 EPITAPHS. 

rate heroes, military, literary, or scientific, need have but 
their names inscribed, and all that has made those names 
immortal is at once recognized. Shakspeare, Milton, Sir 
Isaac Newton, Marlborough, demand no long tale to tell 
you who they were. This simplicity will not do for the 
tombs of men "raised to reputation by accident or caprice," 
or the inscription will soon require an interpreter, and, per- 
haps, as efiectually as curiously, puzzle the prying ones of 
posterity. Next in dignity to the bare name, is a short 
character, simple and unadorned, such as, Isaacus Newtonus, 
Naturcc Legibus investigatis, hie quiescit.* 

" If a man," he said, " is to write a Panegyric, he may keep vices out 
of sight ; but if he professes to write a Life, he must represent it really 
as it was." 

In the Gentleman's Magazine for 1756. p. 382, &c. there is an ar- 
ticle on a new species of epitaphs : in which it is proposed that the 
ages of deceased persons should be reckoned according to the manner 
in which they have improved or abused the time allotted them in their 
lives. For instance, " Here lies Isaac Da Costa, a convert from Juda- 
ism, aged sixty-four. He was born and christened in his sixty-first 
year, and died in the true faith in the third year of his age." 

* See Gentleman's Magazine, 1740, p. 594. The couplet on Sir 
Isaac Newton may be mentioned here, however well known : 
" Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night, 
God said, 'Let Newton be!' and all was light!" 
In the chapel of Trinity College, Cambridge, stands, as you enter 
the vestibule, a very fine statue of Isaac Newton, by Roubillac, with 
the following line on the pedestal, 

" Qui genus huraanura ingenio superavit." 
In the same place is a monument to the memory of Roger Cotes, of 
Trinity College, a celebrated mathematician, who died young ; but 
young as he was, he bid fair to approach nearer to Newton than any 
other English mathematician. His epitaph is short, written by Beattey 
in his happiest style ; this the conclusion, and we mark the beauty and 
force of the repetition in the last line, 

" Pauca quidem sui Ingenii, Pignora reliquit, 
Sed egregia, sed admiranda !" 
Some of the Roman epitaphs were very short. This is Ovid's; and 
it fulfills Dr. Johnson's idea : 

" Ovidianus . Poeta . hie . quiescit." 
Many of them are remarkable for their pathos and simplicity, chiefly 
on the death of children and near relations. Here is one : 
"D. M. S. 
" Plaetoriae . AntiochidaJ . Rarissimse Fcemince . vix . ann . XXVI. 



EPITAPHS. 335 

Dr. Johnson thought rightly that we should " exclude from 
our epitaphs all such allusions as are contrary to the doctrines 
for the propagation of which the churches are erected : " 
hence the epitaph on Cowley, wherein the divinities (Muses) 
that favored him in life are besought to watch over his tomb, 
he condemned as " iminstructive and unaffecting," as " too 
ludicrous for reverence or grief, for Christianity and a tem- 
ple." The designs and decorations, also, of monuments 
ought to be in strict character with the solemnity of the place : 
hence it is not easy " to imagine a greater absurdity than that 
of gracing the walls of a Christian temple with the fig- 
ure of Mars leading a hero to battle, or Cupids sporting round 
a virgin." 

He gives us two Greek inscriptions as a pattern ; and in 
his remarks on these we discover his usual non-respect of 
persons, and his regard for that sentiment which animated 
his own course, showing, that " virtue is impracticable in no 
condition" of poverty, of affliction, of slavery. 

Of Christian epitaphs, he thought that the well-known 
one — 

" Orate pro anima — miserrimi peccatoris." 

was an address to the last degree striking and solemn, as it 
flowed naturally from the religion then believed, and awaken- 
ed in the reader sentiments of benevolence for the deceased, 
and of concern for his own happiness. There was nothing 
trifling or ludicrous, nothing that did not tend to the noblest 
end, the propagation of piety and the increase of devotion." 
Certainly persons in these "more enlightened times" have 
written more ridiculous and absurd epitaphs than ever were 
produced in the monkish ages, " however ignorant and unpol- 
ished." Sometimes they are made to assume an epigram- 
matic turn ; and however brevity is to be commended, surely 
a smart saying is to be carefully avoided. 

Dr. Johnson himself wrote several epitaphs. The one on 

M.III . D.XXI . T. Fl. Capita . Cojugi . CastissimaJ . Piissimse . et . 
de.se. optime . meritae . de . qua . nullum . dolorem . nisi . acerbissi- 
msB . ejus . mortis . acceperat . dignissimse . fecit." 

See "Inscriptionum Antiquarum Sylloge," &c. a Guil. Fleetwood, 
Coll. Regal, apud Cantab. Socio. 1691. 



336 EPITAPHS. 

Hogarth, manufactured between Garrick and himself, is ap- 
propriate ; and the last stanza, especially, very striking : 

" If genius fire thee, reader, stay : 
If nature touch thee, drop a tear ; 
If neither move thee, turn away, 

For Hogarth's honor'd dust lies here." 

That on Philipps, the musician, is smartly expressed ; while 
those on Dr. Goldsmith and on Dr. Parnell are written with 
classical elegance : but, on his principle above laid down, one 
would suppose that Parnell was the more celebrated poet of 
the two. Those on Sir Thomas Hanmer, Henry Thrale, 
Esq., and Mrs. H. M. Salisbury, are long. 

Where an epitaph is written in Latin, there should cer- 
tainly be given a translation in the common tongue of the 
country ; otherwise, one great object of inscribing epitaphs 
would be lost to a great portion of the people. Dr. Johnson 
approved of epitaphs written in Latin ; and such may be fit- 
ting, in cases of eminence, where the living from all parts of 
the world are led to the tombs of the dead. 

Perhaps in no one department of writing has the varied 
talent of mankind been more displayed than in the writing 
of epitaphs. Some inscriptions are of a witty, or serio-comic 
nature ; some laudatory of the dead, at the expense of the 
characters of the living ; some enigmatical ; some expressing 
lamentations in true poetry. We find specimens of these sorts 
largely abounding in Grecian and Roman, as well as in En- 
glish literature. Let a few examples, from modern sources, 
be given. The following was written by the Rev. H. St. J. 
Bullen, Vicar of Dunton, Bucks, on the death of a well-known 
driver of a coach that ran between Aylesbury and London : 

" Parker, farewell ! thy journey now is ended, 
Death has the whip-hand, and with dust thou'rt blended : 
Thy way-hill is examined, and I trust 
Thy last account may prove exact and just : 
When He who rules the chariot of the day 
Where life is light! whose word the living way 
Where travelers like yourself of every ago 
And every clime have taken their last stage, 
The God of mercy, and the God of love, 
Show you the road to Paradise above ' " 



EPITAPHS. 337 

On the sea-coast you find epitaphs of the same kind, but in 
nautical terms. This one is to be seen in Great Neston 
church-yard, in Cheshire, and is but one out of many : 

" Though Boreas' blasts and Neptune's waves 

Have tost me to and fro, 
In spite of both, by God's decree, 

I'm harbor'd here below. 
Here at anchor I do lie 

With many of our fleet, 
In hopes for to set sail again 

Our Saviour Christ to meet." 

The poet Wordsworth (and he and Southey have written 
many epitaphs, from which a few lines might be becomingly 
culled for our church-yards) has condescended to use such 
terms in one of his inscriptions, in which, after more allusions 
to a nautical life, we read :* 

" We sail the sea of life — a calm one finds, 
And one a tempest — and, the voyage o'er 
Death is the quiet haven of us all." 

In the "Gentleman's Magazine," too (1747), an epitaph 
on an inactive vice-admiral thus commences, but we may be 
sure it was not engraved on his tombstone : 

" Pass o'er this grave without concern, 
Here lies old vice from head to stern; 
Averse to strike a blow in fight, 
Inaction was his chief delight. 
He quiet lies, as ofT Toulon, 
Pacific son of old Neptune." 

The following is a specimen of ill-feeling conveyed in the 
same kind of way, and is to be found in St. Weonard's church- 
yard, in the county of Hereford : 

" Life is a city full of crooked streets, 
Death is the market-place where all men meets. 
If life were merchandise that man could buy, 
The rich would live, and all the poor would die." 

Take another, on a poor man buried outside a church ; 
although the authenticity of this, as having been actually used, 
is not vouched for : 

* Wordsworth's Poems, vol. v. p. 305. 
P 




338 EPITAPHS. 

" Here lies I, at the church door : 
Here lies I, because I's poor ! 
The farther you go, the more you pay, 
Hero lies I, as warm as they ! " 

In Eastliope church-yard, in the county of Salop, there is 
the history of a transaction (and, by the way, it is reported 
not to be true), which should never have been placed on a 
tombstone. The narrative is as follows, spoken by two sisters, 
of their brother : 

" Beneath this stone there lies an honest man, 
Whose spotless life the keenest eye might scan, 
For ages past, from father, son, possess'd 
(But here our tears can scarcely be repress'd) 
A little farm whose cot near yonder stile 
Points onward to this ancient sacred pile, 
On his paternal lot he was intent, 
Which gave him bread, with which he was content 
His son in youthful days — hard tale to tell — 
In thoughtless mood the little farm did sell. 
Which shortly turn'd us from our native home, 
Solitary, sad, th' inhospitable world to roam.* 
But Heaven decrees — then why should we repine. 
To dust our dust, to God our souls resign." 

In Stoke Newington church-yard the following words are 
inscribed upon the tomb of a young man who was killed by 
the fire of the military in Lord George Gordon's riots : 
" earth, cover not thou my blood ! " 

This was on the famous Peter Aretine, a man of extraor- 
dinary powers of treachery and presumption, yet flattered and 
loaded with gifts, in his day. A sketch of his character is 
given in the " Gentleman's Magazine" for 1750 ; and this 
satirical epitaph is found in Misson's Voyage to Italy : 

"Comprirait hoc marmor Petri cineres Aretini, 
Mortales atro qui sale perfricuit. 
Intactus Deus est illi, causamque rogatus, 
Hanc dedit, Ille, inquit, non mihi notus erat.' " 



The opening lines of Virgil's 9th Eclogue will occur to some ; 
" O Lycida, vivi pervenimus, ut possessor agelli 
Diceret ; hsec raea sunt ; veteres migrate coloni, 
Nunc virti, tristes, quoniamfors omnia vertatf 
Hos illi (quod nee bene vertat) mittimus hsedos." 



El'lTAPHS. 339 

" Here lies a man, who no man spared, 
When the angry fit was on him ; 
Nor God himself had better fared, 
If Aretine had known him." 

The most practically beneficial epitaph is the celebrated 
one against Quack Doctors, or against taking physic unneces- 
sarily, written by an Italian : 

" Stavo bene, ma per star meglio — sto qui."t 

Here is a specimen of the enigmatical, reputed to be in- 
scribed on a tombstone in the church-yard of Llandinabo, in 
Herefordshire : 

" Templum, Bellum, Spelunca, 
De Terra in Arcu." 

Reader I you must at once be given the meaning of this, for 
probably you would rack your brains in vain. Here it is : 

" Church-war-den 
OF Lland-in-a-bo." 

Let us proceed to a more agreeable order of epitaphs ; and 
of these the name is indeed Legion. Those taken from 
Scripture are perhaps the best. " Thy brother shall rise 
again," was placed on the tombstone of a young man who 
left two sorrowing sisters behind. " Behold I am vile I" 
followed by "Blessed are the dead I" spake on another tomb- 
stone of the fate of both body and soul. The following is on 
a flat stone placed over the grave of a clergyman's widow, in 
Great Neston church-yard : 

" Reader ! 

In the midst of life wc are in death ! 

Be ye therefore ready, 

for ye know neither the 

day nor the hour of 

the Son of Man's coming. 

Farewell, but not for long." 



f This can not be done full justice to in our language, owing to the 
idiom of the Italian tongue, where "cum sto" signifies — "How do you 
do? " It may be translated thus : 

"I was well, but, wishing to bo better, here I am." 



340 EPITAPHS. 

That of Mason on his wife, in the Cathedral of Bristol, 
beginning, 

" Take, holy earth, all that my soul held dear," 

is very beautiful. Also there is one of exquisite beauty in 
the church-yard of Brading, in the Isle of Wight, written by 
an exciseman, and worthy of Burns. Is there not an origin- 
ality in the asking forgiveness for expressing sorrow, and 
entertaining the wish, as told in the first four lines ? 

" Forgive, blest shade, the tributary tear 
Which mourns thy exit from a world like this ; 
Forgive the wish that would have kept thee here, 
And staid thy progress to the realms of bliss."* 

The following is well expressed, had it been on a better 
man : 

" Beneath these poplars' peaceful shade. 
Thy dear remains, Rousseau, are laid : 
Approach ye good, approach ye kind, 
For his was once a kindred mind."t 

This will be admired : 

" The maid that owns this humble stone. 
Was scarce in yonder hamlet known : 
And yet her sweets (but Heaven denied) 
Had graced the cot where late she died ; 
Behold, how fresh the verdure grows. 
Where Peace and Innocence repose. 

" Thou, too, not unimproved depart ; 
Go, guard like her the rural heart. 
Go, keep her grass-grown sod in mind, 
'Till death, the foe whom thou shalt find, 
Bedew'd with many a simple tear, 
Shall lay th}' village virtues here. "J 



* The late Dr. Calcott (Doctor of Music) was so delighted with 
these lines, that he set them to music, and the music may easily ob- 
tained. 

t Gentleman's Magazine, 1748, p. 471. 

X The Student vol. ii. p. 230. 



EPITAPHS. 341 

On a man of literature, on one who was in a shade, but 
shining, we read this : 

" Multis pervulgatus, 
Faucis notus ; 
Qui vitam, inter lucem et umbram, 

Nee eruditus nee idiota, 
Literis deditus, transegit ; sed ut homo 
Qui humani nihil a se alienura putavit. 
Vita siraul, et laboribus functus, 
Hie requiescere voluit." * 

And this one on the famous author of " Anatomy of Melan- 
choly :" 

"Paucis notus, faucioribus ignotus, 
Hie jacet Democritus junior, 
Cui vitam dedit et mortem 
Melancholia." 

The above is the epitaph of a melancholy yet humorous stu- 
dent. On his monument, in Christ Church, is his bust, in 
rufi', gown, hair, and beard — with a scheme of his nativity. 
Of more celebrated epitaphs, these two are pointed and 
concise. This on Raphael's monument, by Cardinal Bembo : 

" lUe hic est Raphael, timuit quo sospite, vinci 
Rerum magna Parens, et moriente mori." t 

On Moliere, the comedian and dramatist : 

"Roscius hic situs est tristi Molierus in urna 
Cui genus humanum ludere, lusus erat. 
Dum ludit Mortem, Mors indignata Jocantera 
Corripit, et Mimum fingere sseva negat." 

Moliere, it will be recollected, wrote a comedy entitled "Le 
Malade Imaginaire," in which he himself acted the part of 
the imaginary sick man, and while acting in the play, was 
taken ill, and died soon after being removed from the stage. 

In the church of Acton Scott, Salop, there is the follow- 
ing inscription, on brass, commemorative of the ancient 
family of Mytton. The father and mother are each repre- 

* Bowyer's Life, p. 558. 

t In plain English prose may be thus rendered, " Here lies that 
Raphael, during whose life Nature feared to be surpassed, and by 
whose death, she feared to die also." 



342 EPITAPHS. 

sented, facing one anotner, kneeling at desks with open books 
thereon, and a death's head on the side of each desk ; their 
hands raised in the attitude of prayer, and themselves hab- 
ited in long robes. Behind the mother are two daughters 
in the same habit and attitude, and behind the father a train 
of nine sons. The engraving of the epitaph, the rhyme of 
which hardly strikes a reader at first, is beneath this repre- 
sentation, which is on a small brass plate, fixed to the north- 
ern wall of the church : 

" Here lyeth entombed in claye the Carcase 
of Elisabeth Mytton who late was the yryffe 
of Thomas Mytton, a gentle -j- by race 
wj'th these aleven god blessed their lyfie. 
When layed together -j- and liffe led aright, 
descended of Gentrye -^- and Daught. she was 
of S. Edward Grydell Albermyke then knight, 
She yelded her breath and endeed her race 
the aleventh of March -J- and y* yere of grace 
A thousand fyve hundred seventye and one 
To whome God grant a Joy full resuryrection." 

In Sir William Sutton's epitaph in Avesham church, Notts, 

is this pretty idea : 

" Sir William Sutton's corpse here tombed sleeps 
Whose happy soul in better mansion keeps 
Thrice nine years lived he with his lady fair, 
A lovely, noble, and like virtuous pair ; 
Their generous offspring, parents' joy of heart, 
Eight of each sex : of each an equal part 
Usher'' d to heaven their father : and the other 
Remained behind him to attend their mother." 

The epitaph on the Earl and Countess of Pembroke and 

their ofi'spring, concludes thus : 

" This was a truly noble family, for all 
The sons were valiant, and all 

The daughters virtuous." 

In Llangarren church-yard are these lines on a young 
child, which are affecting from their beautiful and joyous 
simplicity : 

" Christ ! my happy soul ! 
I M'as so early blest ! 
I was so early call'd, 
To my eternal rest." 



EPITAPHS. d43 

In Tretire chuvch-yard is this : 

" You traveler whoe'er this stone may view, 
Learn to be wise, nor fleeting hopes pursue. 
Life's but an evening breeze, a murm' ring breath, 
Which blows till sunset, then grows calm in death." 

In K-oss church-yard is this very beautifixl one : 

" By all beloved, and by her Saviour bless'd, 
Almost unwarn'd. Death summon'd her away ; 
Yet no alarm the dying saint express'd 
For her whole life was a communion day." 

In Hainton church-yard, near Market Rasen, the following 
words appear on a grave-stone : 

" In memory of Thomas Brown and wife : 
He first deceased : she for a little tried 
To live without him, liked it not, and died." 

In the church-yard of Compton Beauchainp, in Berkshire, 
is this ancient one : 

" Here licth the Bodie 

of Margaret White, 

who died the 20th of July, 

Anno Domini 1627, 

in her tender yeares. 

MORIOR. 

" A weeke of yeares I 
Lived, and that exprest, 
God called me hence to 
Heav'n's Sabbatick rest. 
I ranne according to 
My yeares my race. 
And now God's glorie 
Crownes in me His grace." 

Dr. Johnson, after quoting a saying of Seneca, that "death 
falls heavy upon him who is too much known to others, and 
too little to himself," gives us* the instructive epitaph on the 
tomb of Pontanus, a man celebrated among the early restorers 
of literature : 

" I am Pontanus, beloved by the powers of literature, admired by 
men of worth, and dignified by the monarchs of the world. Thou 



* Rambler, No. 28. Pontanus was an Italian statesman, historian, 
and Latin poet. Born a.d. 1426; died a.d. 1503. 



344 EPITAPHS. 

knowest now who I am, or more properly who I was. For thee, 
stranger, I who am in darkness can not know thee, but I entreat thee to 
know thyself." 

Johnson wrote an elegant Latin epitaph for the tomb 
of his wife, and also epitaphs for his father, mother, and 
brother ; and in giving his orders, he writes, " Do not let 
the difference of ten pounds, or more, defeat our purpose." 
The remembrance of poor " Tetty" is one of the best traits 
of Dr. Johnson's tenderness of heart. In this he was equaled 
by the benevolent Howard ; for we are told, " that the day 
of her death" (of the wife of Howard) "was held sacred 
in his calendar — ^kept for evermore as a day of fasting and 
meditation."* But Dr. Johnson's sermon on the death of 
his wife is her best epitaph ; an epitaph which can convey 
comfort and warning to thousands of her fellow-creatures. 
" In this age of wild opinions," he says, " she was as free 
from skepticism as the cloistered virgin. She never wished 
to signalize herself by the singularity of paradox. She had 
a just diffidence of her own reason, and desired to practice 
rather than to dispute. Her practice was such as her 
opinions naturally produced. She was exact and regular in 
her devotions, full of confidence in the divine mercy, sub- 
missive to the dispensations of Providence, extensively charit- 
able in her judgments and opinions, grateful for every kind- 
ness that she received, and willing to impart assistance of 
every kind to all whom her little power enabled her to 
benefit."! And then he warns all, " lest he who looks on 
this grave unalarmed, may sink vinreformed into his own." 

* We are informed by his biographer, that "every thing connected 
with her memory, how distantly soever, was hallowed in his mind by 
the association. Many years after her demise, on the eve of his de- 
parture on one of his perilous journeys across the continent of Europe, 
he was walking in the gardens with his son, examining some planta- 
tions, &c. On coming to the planted walk, he stood still: there was 
a pause in the conversation ; the old man's thoughts were busy with 
the past. At length he broke silence. "Jack," said he, in a tender 
and solemn tone, " in case I should not come back, you will pursue 
this work, or not, as you may think proper ; but remember, this walk 
was planted by your mother ; and, if eve?- you touch a twig of it, may 
my blessing never rest upon youT^ 

t Vol. ii. p. 235. 



EPITAPHS. 345 

Yes — this should be the grand care and concern of all ; 
and many, in various ways,* do bear this thought in their 
remembrance all the days of their life. Johnson said that 
this rule of Dr. Cheyne should be imprinted on every mind : 
" To neglect nothing to secure my eternal peace, more than 
if I had been certified I should die vi^ithin the day ; nor to 
mind any thing that my secular obligations and duties 
demanded of me, less than if I had been insured to live fifty 
years more." And excellently hath Sir Thomas Browne 
said,t " Be substantially great in thyself, and more than thou 
appearest unto others : and let the world be deceived in thee, 
as they are in the lights of heaven. Measure not thyself by 
thy morning shadow, but by the extent of thy grave : and 
reckon thyself above the earth, by the line thou must be 
contented with under it Could the world unite in 

* Some take a singular mode of doing this ; for instance, " Mr. 
Dick Smith, master of the tap-house, Vauxhall. The singular oddity 
of this man's character may be worth relating. He had caused one 
part of his tap-room to be painted, representing a country church and 
church-yard, with grave-stones, and the initial letters of such of his 
deceased friends as he deemed worthy to lie in the best ground, with a 
grave left open for himself to lie among them. Those whom he 
deemed mean, pitiful fellows, were placed in the poor ground, at a dis- 
tance. This man being thus familiarized with death, took a formal leave 
of his friends about twelve o'clock on Thursday, though seemingly in 
good health ; told them he should never see them more, went up stairs, 
and died in about half an hour after ; and is now put into a coffin of a 
new construction, made of different sorts of wood, and without nails, 
with a lock and two keys, which he had by him since Christmas for 
that purpose." — Gentlanan'' s Magazine for May 30th, 1782. 

Yet we may be reminded that Archbishop Parker ordered his tomb- 
stone to be fitted up befoi-e his death, that he might look upon it while 
he lived. He had many inscriptions, reminding him of death, engraven 
on the walls of his house and the glass of his windows ; and on the 
seal of his See was the manner of the last Judgment. Bishop Wilson 
(Sodor and Man) also ordered a favorite elm to be cut down and sawed 
into planks some years before his death, so that in the preparation 
made for his coffin he might have a memento mori before his eyes. 
Jeremy Taylor tells us always to let the striking of the clock be 
accompanied with a meditation on our proportionate advancement to 
eternity. 

t Christian Morals, by Sir Thomas Browne, of Norwich, author of 
ReJigio Medici. Payne. Dr. Johnson wrote the author's life, which is 
prefixed to this work- 



346 EPITArHS. 

the practice of that despised train of virtues, which the divine 
ethics of our Saviour hath so inculcated upon us, the furious 
face of tilings must diswppear : Eden would be yet to be 
found, and the angels might look down, not with pity, but 
joy upon us." 

And to bring the subject still more home to every indi- 
vidual, let the following lines be quoted for the mindfulness 
of a time that must come to each reader in more or less 
degree : 

" Oh ! the sad day, 
When men shall shake their heads and say, 
Of miserable me, 
Hark how he groans ! look how he pants for breath 
See how he struggles in the pangs of death ! 
When they shall say of these my eyes. 
How hollow and how dim they be ! 
Look how his breast doth swell and rise 
Against his potent enemy ! 
When some old friend shall step to ray bedside, 
Touch my chill face, and thence shall gently slide ; 

And when his next companions say, 
How does he do ? what hopes ? — shall turn away, 
Answering only with a lift-up hand, 

Who can his fate withstand ? 
Then shall a gasp or two do more. 
Than all my rhetoric could before, 
Persuade the world to trouble me no more." 

And more than this — ^for in that awful hour must every 
man, however orthodox in sacred knowledge, however pious 
in daily practice, and however dignified in person or estate, 
exclaim, with the almost matchless George Herbert, 

" Throw away thy rod. 
Throw away thy wrath, 

O my God, 
Take the gentle path." 

And would not these very lines themselves form a good 
epitaph ? "What better prayer for the soul (if it could be 
permitted to pray) awaiting the tribunal of the judgment 
day ? Doubtless, from many of our sacred poets appropriate 
lines might be selected for the purpose of epitaphs : and it 
would be well, if the friends of the deceased would usually 



EPITAPHS. 347 

consult the clergyman of the parish, or some other discreet 
friend, in this matter, rather than, by leaving the choice to 
an unlettered stone-cutter, deface the tomb-stones of a church- 
yard.* We should best obtain modest and instructive 
epitaphs, if persons in their life-time would select some 
sentence or verse v^^hich they might feel would have a solemn 
effect either on the devout perambulator, or on the mere idle 
stroller, in our church-yards. And what could be a more 
grateful idea than that of contributing to the welfare of our 
fellow-creatures, however few, after we are gone I 

" Nunc vivo, neque adhuc homines luceraque relinquo ! 
Sed linquam." 



* See Tract on Tombstones, by Rev. E. Paget : also, Remarks on 
English Churches, by T. H. Markland, F.R.S. & S.A. 



CHAPTER XXI. 
CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE.— THE FEAR OF DEATH. 

We now come to a subject that all men should regard 
with feelings of solemnity and awe, and discourse of in a 
gentle tone, as Dr. Johnson ever did — namely, the fear of 
death. And herein we shall view so much of the true mag- 
nanimity of his mind — the tenderness of his conscience — the 
reality of his soul's religion — that if we have admired his 
talent and his benevolence in life, we shall i-everence his 
resignation and fortitude, at the last, in death. That he had 
a fear of death continually before him, is a fact ; but it was, 
though not wholly, a becoming fear, the fear of a mind sensi- 
ble of the doom that awaited the transgressor, sensible of the 
justice of the Almighty, sensible of his own utter unworthi- 
ness, fearful lest Christ's merits might not avail him ; it was 
the fear of a steadfast believer who dare not acquit himself, 
dare not presumptuously anticipate the sentence of his Judge, 
of one, who, with a permission to cherish hope, must, to the 
very last, xvork out his OKm salvation with fear and 
tremhling. 

Let us first present his own recorded sayings and conver- 
sations on this matter, and they are worthy our profoundest 
consideration and reflection, at the same time that they must, 
in no small degree, call forth our pity and regret. 

He was a man that never could bear bravado upon any 
occasion. General Paoli had said, that a great portion of 
the fashionable infidelity sprung out of a desire of showing 
courage. " Men," observed the general, " who have no op- 
portunity of showing it as to things in this life, take death 
and futurity as objects on which to display it." Johnson 
answered, " That is mighty foolish affectation. Fear is one 
of the passions of human nature, of which it. is impossible to 
divest it. You remember that the Emperor Charles V., 



FEAR OF DEATH. 349 

when he read upon the tombstone of a Spanish nobleman, 
' Here lies one who never knew fear,' wittily said, " Then he 
never snufi'ed a candle with his fingers.' " 

Ho was much pleased with a remark of General Paoli, 
which was mentioned to him by Boswell, " That it is im- 
possible not to be afraid of death ; and that those who at 
the time of dying are not afraid, are not thinking of death, 
but of applause, or something else, which keeps death out of 
their sight : so that all men are equally afraid of death when 
they see it : only some have a power of turning away their 
sight from it better than others." 

This observation must particularly apply to soldiers in the 
tumult and glory of battle. Johnson looked upon prepara- 
tion for death as the grand thing, and would have had all 
soldiers especially prepared. " If a man," he said, " can be 
supposed to make no provision for death in war, what can be 
the state that would have awakened him to the care of 
futurity ? When would that man have prepared himself to 
die, who went to seek death without preparation ?" 

There is an article in the Gentlema?i's Magazine (1747) 
which bears strong internal evidence of being the production 
of Johnson's pen, on the behavior of Lord Lovat at his ex- 
ecution, and which censures the display of pleasantry and 
lightness in the hour of death. Lord Lovat was a profli- 
gate, hypocritical, and cowardly man : had he been better, and 
braver, he would have met the " last enemy" in a diflerent 
spirit, and with other bearing. 

"When I first entered Ranelagh," says Johnson, speaking 
of the Vauxhall-gardens of his day, " it gave an expansion 
and gay sensation to my mind, such as I never experienced 
any where else. But as Xerxes wept when he viewed his 
immense army, and considered that not one of that great 
multitude would be alive a hundred years afterward, so it 
went to my heart to consider that there was not one in all 
that brilliant circle that was not afraid to go home and 
think : but that the thoughts of each individual there would 
be distressing when alone." Alas I how many would die 
without thinking — and the more thought, the more fear of 
death. 



350 CLOSE OF DK. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

'' You know," he says to Mrs. Thrale, " I never thought 
confidence with respect to futurity any ixtrt of the character 
of a brave, a wise, or a good man. Bravery has no place 
where it can avail nothing : wisdom impresses strongly the 
consciousness of those faults, of which it is, perhaps, itself an 
aggravation ; and goodness, always wishing to be better, and 
imputing every deficiency to criminal indulgence, and every 
fault to voluntary corruption, never dares to suppose the con- 
dition of forgiveness fulfilled, nor what is wanting in the 
crime supplied by penitence." But, surely, in such a case 
there is a lack of faith in the promises, of God ? 

" The serenity which is not felt," he says again, " it can 
be no virtue to feign." 

The sternest love of truth always pervaded his mind. 
He once said, " There is something noble in publishing truth, 
though it condemns one's self," and we may feel certain that, 
as in life's best days, so in its last hour, he would be no dis- 
sembler. Boswell told him of the unconcerned way in which 
some criminals met their death at Tyburn gallows : " Most 
of them," said Johnson, "have never thought at all." " But," 
asked Boswell, " is not the fear of death natural to man ?" 
Johnson answered, " So much so, sir, that the whole of life 
is but keeping away the thoughts of it." He then, in a low 
and earnest tone, talked of his meditating upon the awful 
hour of his own dissolution, and in what manner he should 
conduct himself upon that occasion. " I know not," he said, 
" whether I should wish to have a friend by me, or have it 
all between God and myself" How awful must it have 
been to have heard this ; and yet how much real courage in 
the thought ! 

To Boswell's inquiry, whether we might not fortify our 
minds for the approach of death, he answered, " No, sir, let 
it alone. It matters not hoio a man dies, but how he lives. 
The act of dying is not of importance, it lasts so short a 
time." He added, with an earnest look, " A man knows it 
must be so, and submits. It will do him no good to whine." 

To Boswell he wrote, in the beginning of the year in which 
he died, " My nights are very sleepless, and very tedious, and 
yet I am extremely afraid of dying." 



FEAR OF DEATH. 351 

Two months after, he wrote to Dr. Taylor, " O my friend, 
the approach of death is very dreadful ! I am afraid to think 
on that which I know I can not avoid. It is vain to look 
round and round for that help which can not be had. Yet 
we hope and hope, and fancy that he who has lived to-day 
may live to-morrow. But let us learn to derive our hope 
only from God. In the mean time, let us be kind one to 
another.'' 

Here, amid some salutary feelings of a righteous fear, with 
much painful misgiving, we perceive his moral and religious 
heroism to break forth : looking unto God, like David, in all 
affliction : cherishing kindness, like St. Paul, toward all his 
fellow-creatures. He does not whine, he submits. 

Somewhat later, when at Oxford, he acknowledged that 
he was much oppressed by the fear of death. The amiable 
Dr. Adams suggested that God was infinitely good. 

Johnson. — "That He is infinitely good, as far as the per- 
fection of His nature will allow, I certainly, believe ; but it 
is necessary for good upon the whole, that individuals should 
be punished. As to an individual, therefore. He is not 
infinitely good : and as I can not be sure that I have fulfilled 
the conditions on which salvation is granted, I am afraid I 
may be one of those who shall be damned." 

Dk. Adams. — " What do you mean by damned ?" 

Johnson. — loudly and passionately — " Sent to hell, sir, 
and punished everlastingly." 

Dr. Adams. — " I don't believe that doctrine." 

Johnson. — " Hold, sir ; do you believe that some will be 
punished at all ?" 

Dr. Adams. — " Being excluded from heaven will be a 
punishment ; yet there may be no great positive suffering." 

Johnson. — "Well, sir, but if you admit any degree of 
punishment, there is an end of your argument for infinite 
goodness, simply considered ; for infinite goodness would inflict 
no punishment whatever. There is not infinite goodness 
physically considered ; morally there is." 

BoswELL — " But may not a man attain to such a degree 
of hope as to keep him quiet ? You see I am not quiet, from 
the vehemence with which I talk ; but I do not despair," 



352 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

Mrs. Adams. — "You seem, sir, to forget the merits of our 
Redeemer." 

Johnson. — '•' Madam, I do not forget tlie merits of my 
Redeemer ; but my Redeemer has said that He will set 
some on His right hand, and some on His left." He was in 
gloomy agitation, and said, " I'll have no more on't." 

This was one of Johnson's gloomiest conversations ; and 
his solemn feelings, together with his desire not to intrude on 
unsearchable matters, prompted him now, as at other times, 
to cease from further conversation ; especially since it had 
come to a point when he would rather humble himself in 
prayer and reflection, than continue merely to talk, although 
his talking took place with none who were inclined to be 
vain, or scoff, or think lightly. We must always bear in 
mind, that he was subject to a hypochondriac disorder, which, 
in spite of every resolution to the contrary, will weigh down 
the spirits involuntarily. Indeed, he would have manifested 
any degree of courage to get rid of this melancholy distemper, 
and, on one occasion, he emphatically exclaimed, " I would 
consent to have a limb amputated to recover my spirits." 
Let the naturally cheerful Christian pause, before he ventures 
to condemn. 

He always felt severely the loss of friends. Soon after 
this conversation, he writes to Dr. Burney, " I have lost dear 
Mr. Allen ; and wherever I turn, the dead or the dying meet 
my notice, and force my attention upon misery and mortality." 
He adds, " We have run this morning (in a chariot) twenty- 
four miles, and could run forty-eight more. But ivho can 
run the race ivith Death ?" The italics are his own. For 
Allen he had a high esteem, and when struck speechless a 
year before, he wrote to him immediately to come, and arrange 
his affairs. Probably he looked for his faithful services at a 
future day. 

Mrs. Piozzi bears testimony that Johnson had no fear, ex- 
cept on the thought of death. " Fear was, indeed," she says, 
" a sensation to which Dr. Johnson was an utter stranger" 
(she goes further than he himself would allow), " excepting 
when some sudden apprehensions seized him that he was 
going to die : and, even then, he kept all his wits about him, 



FEAR OF DEATH. 353 

to express the most humble and pathetic petitions to the Al- 
mighly ;" and she gives us instances of his calmness, even 
when in supposed peril of death. 

It was no puling fear that affected Dr. Johnson, even in 
this latter case, for he always placed the sensation on a 
rational foundation. It was not the actual pain of dying 
that he dreaded, but the hereafter that followed. Some per- 
sons in a company at Salisbury, of which Dr. Johnson was 
one, vouched for the company, that there was nobody in it 
afraid of death. "Speak for yourself, sir," said Johnson, 
" for indeed, I am." 

" I did not say of dying," replied the other ; " but of death, 
meaning its consequences." 

" And so I mean," rejoined the doctor ; "I am very seri- 
ously afraid of the consequences." 

So far from fearing the actual pang of death, he thought 
it wrong that any one should not be told of its approach. 
<' I deny," he said, " the lawfulness of telling a lie to a sick 
man, for fear of alarming him. You have no business with 
consequences; you are to tell the truth. Of all lying, I have 
the greatest abhorrence of this, because I believe it has been 
frequently practiced on myself" A lie is justifiable, accord- 
ing to Paley, in some extreme cases of self-preservation, but 
certainly not in this matter ; and besides, we should always 
recollect, that even if the uttermost inconvenience should 
follow, all will soon be rectified, and the departed person 
may have reason to rejoice in that course being pursued, 
against which his wishes revolted when on the earth. 

It is certain, that he thought that every good man should 
be fearful of death. When told that Dr. Dodd seemed to 
be willing to die, and full of hopes of happiness, " Sir," said 
he, " Dr. Dodd would have given both his hands and both 
his legs to have lived. The better a man is, the more afraid 
is he of death, having a clearer view of infinite purity." In 
this sentiment, we can not but think Dr. Johnson as wholly 
wrong, as he is right in many of his observations. It may 
be said, that all the Gospel, written, felt, and practiced, is 
against him. Boswell mentioned to him a friend of his who 
was formerly gloomy from low spirits, and much distressed 



354 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

by the fear of death, but was now uniformly placid, and con- 
templated his dissolution without any perturbation. " Sir," 
said Johnson, " this is only a disordered imagination taking 
a different turn." And yet in himself in his last hours it 
was not so. 

Boswell related a passage in Hawthornden's " Cypress 
Grove," wherein it is said, that after having been in the 
^how-room of life, we should cheerfully give place to others, 
as those before us had given their room to us. " Yes, sir," 
said Johnson, " if he is sure he is to be well after he goes out 
of it. But if he is to grow blind after he goes out of the 
show-room, and never to see any thing again, or if he does 
not know whither he is to go next, a man will not go cheer- 
fully out of a show-room. No wise man will be contented to 
die, if he thinks he is to go into a state of punishment. Nay, 
no wise man will be contented to die, if he thinks he is to 
fall into annihilation ; for, however unhappy any man's ex- 
istence may be, he yet would rather have it, than not exist 
at all. No : there is no rational principle by which a man 
can die contented, but a trust in the mercy of God, through 
the merits of Jesus Christ." 

"This short sermon," observes Boswell, "delivered with 
an earnest tone, in a boat upon the sea, which was perfectly 
calm, on a day appropriated to religious worship, while every 
one listened with an air of satisfaction, had a most pleasing 
eSect upon my mind." What a contrast, we may add, be- 
tween the really brave mind of the religious Dr. Johnson, and 
the feignedly bold one of the skeptical Shelley, when passing 
over God's seas.* 

Boswell expressed a horror at the thought of death. 

Mrs. Knowles. — " Nay, thou shouldest not have a horror 
for what is the gate of life." 

Johnson. — (standing upon the hearth, rolling about, with 
a serious, solemn, and somewhat gloomy air) — " No rational 
man can die without uneasy apprehension." 

Mrs. Knowles. — " The Scripture tells us, ' The righteous 
shall have haj^e in his death.' " 

* See Julian and Maddalo — and Shelley, after this conversation actu- 
ally drowned ! 



FEAR OF DEATH. 355 

Johnson. — "Yes, madam; that is, he shall not have de- 
spair. But, consider, his hope of salvation must be founded 
on the terms on which it is promised that the mediation of 
our Saviour shall be applied to us, namely, obedience : and 
where obedience has failed, then, as suppletory to it, repent- 
ance. But what man can say, that his obedience has been 
such as he would approve of in another, or even in himself, 
upon close examination, or that his repentance has not been 
such as to require being repented of? No man can be sure 
that his obedience and repentance will obtain salvation." 

Mrs. Knowles continued, " But divine intimation of ac- 
ceptance may be made to the soul." 

Johnson. — " Madam, it may ; but I should not think the 
better of a man who should tell me on his death-bed, he was 
sure of salvation. A man can not be sure himself that he 
has divine intimation of acceptance, much less can he make 
others sure that he has it." 

BoswELL. — "Then sir, we must be contented to acknowl- 
edge that death is a terrible thing." 

Johnson. — "Yes, sir, I have made no approaches to a 
state which can look on it as not terrible." 

Mrs. Knowles. — " Does not St. Paul say, ' I have fought 
the good fight of faith, I have finished my course ; henceforth 
is laid up for me a crown of life?' " 

Johnson. — " Yes, madam ; but here was a man inspired, 
a man who had been converted by supernatural interposition." 

BoswELL. — " In prospect death is dreadful ; but in fact 
we find that people die easy." 

Johnson. — " Why, sir, most people have not thought 
much of the matter, so can not say much, and it is supposed 
they die easy. Few believe it certain they are then to die ; 
and those who do, set themselves to behave with resolution, 
as a man does who is going to be hanged : he is not the less 
unwilling to be hanged." 

At another time he said, talking of the fear of death, 
" Some people are not afraid, because they look upon salvation 
as the efi'ect of an absolute decree, and think they feel in 
themselves the marks of sanctification. Others, and those 
the most rational, in my opinion, look upon salvation as con- 



356 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

ditional ; and as they never can be sure that they have com- 
plied with the conditions, they are afraid." 

The terms of salvation are certainly conditional ; they are 
on the condition that we believe ; and if we really believe, 
we love ; and if we truly love, we keep Christ's command- 
ments ; so that the conditions are, faith, love, and obedience, 
with repentance and conversion from any sin we may unhap- 
pily fall into ; and this we call justification by faith alone, 
because we mean thereby a faith that worketh by love. 

He had before warned Boswell against transitory impres- 
sions. " Do not, sir, accustom yourself to trust to impres- 
sions. There is a middle state between conviction and hy- 
pocrisy, of which many are unconscious." And after stating 
the danger of impressions, as destroying our free agency, he 
continued, " Favorable impressions at particular moments, as 
to the state of our souls,* may be deceitful and dangerous. 
In general, no man can be sure of his acceptance with God : 
some, indeed, may have had it revealed to them. St. Paul, 
who wrought miracles, may have had a miracle wrought on 
himself, and may have obtained supernatural assurance of 
pardon, mercy, and beatitude ; yet St. Paul, though he ex- 
presses strong hope, also expresses fear. Jest having preached 
to others, ho himself should be cast away." 

Not fear, but caution, exclusive of the ground of fear. St. 
Paul's hope was contingent on his continued mortification 
and subjection of the body. He also says, "I know whom 
I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep 
that which I have committed unto him against that day." 

* Cecil says, " A sanguine man sees a sign and token in every 
thing, in every ordinary occurrence his imagination hears a call ; his 
pious fancy is the source and food of an eager, disquieted, and restless 
habit of mind." 

Again, " Constitutional bias is a suspicious interpreter oi Providential 
Leadings.^'' — CeciVs Remains. 

Charles Simeon writes, after a dangerous illness, " As for joyful an- 
ticipations of the blessedness of heaven, neither the habit of my mind, 
nor the state of my body, nor indeed, the character of my religion (the 
religion of a sinner at the foot of the cross), led to them : to be ' kept 
in perfect peace' was more in accordance with my wishes, and that 
mercy God richly vouchsafed unto me," &c. — Letter to Bishop of Cal- 
cutta, Memoirs, p. 515, see also p. 181, 489. 



FEAR OF DEATH. 357 

Whether he here means his own soul, or the great charge of 
the Christian rehgion,* we see here nothing but the fullest 
confidence in Christ, none in himself He would still ex- 
claim, " Let him that thinketh he standeth," in sure accept- 
ance with God, " take heed lest he fall ;" fall away by sinful 
habits from a state of grace. 

Preparation for death was the great concern of Dr. John- 
son's life, and we can imagine that the words, " Prepare to 
meet thy God" were never absent from his memory. In a 
letter to Mrs. Porter, he writes, " As we daily see our friends 
die round us, we that are left must cling closer, and, if we 
can do nothing more, at least pray for one another ; and re- 
member, that as others die we must die too, and prepare our- 
selves diligently for the last great trial." 

Well did he, in general terms, define the happiness of the 
blessed. " The happiness," he said, " of an unembodied 
spirit will consist in a consciousness of the favor of God, in 
the contemplation of truth, and in the possession of felicita- 
ting ideas." 

BoswELL suggested : "One of the most pleasing thoughts 
is, that we shall see our friends again." 

Johnson. — " Yes, sir ; but you must consider, that when 
we are become purely rational, many of our friendships will 
be cut off. Many friendships are formed by a community 
of sensual pleasures ; all these will be cut off. We form 
many friendships with bad men, because they have agreeable 
qualities, and they can be useful to us ; but, after death, 
they can no longer be of use to us. We form many friend- 
ships by mistake, imagining people to be different from what 
they really are. After death, we shall see every one in a 
true light. Then, sir, they talk of our meeting our relations ; 
but then all relationship is dissolved ; and we shall have no 
regard for one person more than another ; but for their real 
value. However, we shall either have the satisfaction of 
meeting our friends, or be satisfied without meeting them." 
What good sense pervades this conversation. 

BoswELL continued. — " Yet, sir, we see in Scripture, that 
Dives still retained an anxious concern about his brethren." 
* This latter is the opinion of Di. Pye Smith. .'.' 



353 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

He might also have mentioned chap. vi. 9—11, of St. John's 
E/evelations. 

Johnson. — " Why, we must either suppose that passage 
to be metaphorical, or hold, with many divines, and all the 
Purgatorians, that departed souls do not all at once arrive 
at the utmost perfection of which they are capable." 

Bos WELL. — " I think, sir, that is a very rational supposi- 
tion." 

Johnson. — '• Why, yes, sir ; but we do not know it is a 
true one. There is no harm in believing it ; but you must 
not compel others to make it an article of faith ; for it is not 
revealed." 

We may, however, think that it is revealed, as we have 
before shown. 

Boswell was fond of inducing Johnson to speak of the 
future life. He relates the following in a pleasing manner. 
" While Johnson and I stood in calm conference in Dr. Tay- 
lor's garden at a pretty late hour in a serene autumn night, 
looking up to the heavens, I directed the discourse to the sub- 
ject of a future state. My friend was in a placid and most 
benignant frame of mind. ' Sir,' said he, ' I do not imagine 
that all things will be made clear to us immediately after 
death, but that the ways of Providence will be explained to 
us very gradually.' " 

When told, at another time, that Dr. Percy felt uneasiness 
at the thoughts of leaving his house, his study, his books, he 
remarked, " This is foolish in Percy ; a man need not be un- 
easy on these grounds ; for, as he will retain his conscious- 
ness, he may say with the philosopher, omnia nica onccuvv 
porto^ One of the Essays of Elia will recur to our memory, 
in connection with this feeling of Dr. Percy. 

FEAR OF DEATH IN CHRISTIAN MEN. 

Such were Johnson's feelings on the subject of death, and 
before we come to his own last hours, let us say a few words 
on this solemn matter. It is very certain that the fear of 
death is a natural fear ; it is implanted by the God of nature 



FEAR OF DEATH. 359 

ill our hearts. We can see the reason of this — because but 
for its strong hold on our minds, men would too often be com- 
mitting suicide ; and murder itself might be regarded as a 
kindness. The Scriptures represent the future life as so su- 
premely happy, that not only should we seek death for the 
purpose of escaping the pains of life, but even its pleasures, 
seeing that these are so inferior when compared with those in 
store for us. Let us put it in this way : suppose a poor man 
was to be told that at such a time, some few years forward, 
he was to succeed to an estate ; that every pleasure should 
accompany his possession of it ; that he himself would be 
relieved from labor, and that his wife and children would in 
due time be elevated to his state of prosperity and peace ; do 
we not suppose that he would count the very hours and minutes, 
and long for the years to elapse, that he might enter upon 
his inheritance, and from the state of a servant become a 
master, from that of a laborer be a lord ? Well, such is 
the change that awaits the Christian man. And why does 
he not desire this change to happen at the earliest period ? 
Why do Christians become alarmed, and send earnestly for 
the physician, at the approach of illness ? Why do they 
mourn over a sick friend, and cherish, as rays of the happiest 
hope, any little daily amendment in his health ? and why do 
they thank God that themselves and friends are spared ? 
Spared from what ? Spared from His own presence, kept 
out of heaven, longer chained to the flesh and the earth. 
We do not doubt of the existence of heaven, or feel any un- 
certainty of our brother's likelihood of abode there, and still 
we do all we can to keep him in this world, and mourn his 
release as a calamity — a calamity often all but insupportable. 
And why is this ? It is because God has implanted certain 
feelings in the human heart, which His own religion may 
guide, but can not extirpate — these are, the fear of death, 
and the love of the brethren. 

The fear of death. Should not a perfect love of God cast 
out that fear ? It may : but we are to cherish another kind 
of fear connected with this subject, a fear of offending God to 
the very end of our days, and who can say that he offendeth 
not ? The law of the fear of death is not only given by 



360 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

nature for the preservation of life, but also it is continued 
though in fainter degree, to the spiritual man for the further 
reason of keeping his soul careful and humble. Though he 
may desire the enjoyment of heaven, as much as the poor 
man longs for the inheritance of his earthly state, yet he is to 
strive to preserve, to the best of his pow^er, that breath of life 
which God has given to his care, and to know that it may be 
God's gracious purpose that he should be more fully tried and 
exercised before he enter on his heavenly possessions, and 
therefore he is to wait in patience till his change come. 
Thus he can not have the certainty stated in the poor man's 
case. For, on this question the whole matter depends, name- 
ly, whether any man can, at any period of his life, say, that 
he is quite prepared to meet his God ; or that he can have 
any communication, or assurance granted him, that he is cer- 
tain to go to heaven ? If there be the slightest doubt, there 
must be fear, a proper and reverential fear. Dr. Johnson, 
as we have seen, thought that man could have no certainty; 
and we may reasonably think that a man can not be acquit- 
ted, to his own knowledge, before his judgment. God knows 
well who are pardoned even in this life, because He knows 
those who have truly repented, and unfeignedly believed 
His holy Gospel, and who will not fall away ; but can men 
not have this knowledge ? If not, it must be with Christians 
as with the enlightened heathen who exclaimed, " Call no man 
happy" (certainly happy for eternity) "before his death."*' 

* There is a kind of religious teaching which is very apt to betray 
souls. The first direction given to men of all characters, is to set out 
with a firm persuasion of their reconciliation with God and their enjoy- 
ment of everlasting happiness. This is surely an inverted order of 
things. For, our right to the comfort of the promises made to believ- 
ing Christians, can only be ascertained by the agreement of the temper 
of our minds and the course of our lives, with the Scr»iiture characters 
of those privileged persons to whom those promises are appropriated; 
and to exhort men to arrogate that comfort to themselves, previous to 
any degree of holy conformity in disposition and conduct to those descrip- 
tive characters, is to take the children's bread and give it unto dogs, is 
to act without gospel warrant or authority, to prescribe rashly, and fatal- 
ly to mislead the souls of men. This kind of teaching too often leads 
to nothing better than a bold, presumptuous confidence. Whereas, even 
with evidence of the best sort attending his course, the true Christian 



FEAR OF DEATH. 361 

Very many men will argue for the contrary of this ; for men 
love to think that they are converted and certain of salvation ; 
but the best divines, the purest and humblest of men, will 
not be contented, save when the work and fruits of the Spirit 
inspire mnch hope, with delusive sensations of the mind or 
heart, that heart which is before all things deceitful. 

Many quotations might be given from such men as Jeremy 
Taylor, Hall, and Beveridge. But hear our thoughtful and 
evangelical divines of modern times. " For us," says Shuttle- 
worth,* "whose feet have yet to tread the valley of the 
shadow of death, and to whose eyes the mysterious vail, which 
conceals the things of the unknown world, has not yet been 
lifted up, pride were ridiculous, and confidence premature." 
Dr. Arnold, in an excellent discourse! on Mark xii. 34, tells 
us, in asking Who are chosen ? that " the term (chosen) can 
by us, strictly speaking, be applied, in its full sense, to those 
only who are passed beyond the reach of evil ;" and he will 
not talk of the " chosen irrevocably." Dr. Hampden writes 
to the same effect, as also Archbishop Whately. Charles 
Simeon said, | " I think it clear, even to demonstration, that 
assurance is not necessary to saving faith : a simple reliance 
on Christ for salvation is that faith which the word of God 
requires : assurance is a privilege, but not a duty ;" and he 
said, that a man " may be fully assured of Christ's power and 
willingness to save him, and yet not be assured that Christ 
has actually imparted salvation to him." This is a distinc- 
tion in which all the difference lies. The Rev. Mr. Jay tells 
us, § that cheerfulness in the prospect of death is not invari- 
ably nor commonly the feeling of good men. " The fear of 

will always proceed on his course trembling while rejoicing. Dr. 
Arnold draws the picture, " To-day, penitent, justified, and full of assur- 
ance — to-morrow, it may be, cast down, and full of humiliation and 
godly fear. So it will be, and so it must be, till having finished our 
course, and the work of the tempter being ended, and his power stopped 
forever, we may find there is a peace to be no more disturbed, a rest to 
be no more broken, an assurance to be no more troubled with fear." 
Dr. ArnolcCs Sermons, vol. iii. p. 400. 

* Sermons on the Leading Principles of Christianity : Ser. 10. 

t Christian Life, its Course, &c., Sermon 13. 

t Simeon's Memoirs, by Rev. W. Carus, p. 20. 

§ The Christian Contemplated, &c., Lect. 10, p. 341, &c. 

Q 



362 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

death," he says, " is naturally unavoidable : and must there- 
fore in itself be innocent " — " there are many Christians whose 
anxieties and forebodings with regard to death, are only dis- 
pelled and destroyed by the event itself" — the Christian often 
" feels much more in the prospect than numbers of those feel, 
who are ruined by the reality" — and he begs the Christian 
not to be ashamed of this feeling, adding, " Do not conclude 
that it is an evidence against the reality or degree of your 
religion. Do not imagine that it disproves, or renders suspi- 
cious, your attachment to the Saviour." <' Some religionists," 
he goes on to say, " are fond of the marvelous and the sud- 
den : and our obituaries are often filled with the triumphant 
departures of those who began to pray a few days before. 
This is often peculiarly the case with malefactors. Few of 
these, if attended by some divines, but in a few hours are 
quickly ripened for a confident and joyful death. We do not 
wish to limit the Holy One of Israel in the freeness of His 
mercy and grace. But wiser people hesitate about these 
prodigies. They wish for more certainty, more evidence than 
can satisfactorily be obtained in cases where the impressions 
of the condition can scarcely be distinguished from the oper- 
ation of the principle : and therefore, while they may some- 
times indulge a hope, they will rarely be disposed to proclaim 
it." The fact is, there is often too much religious excitement 
used in such and other cases, and the man is thrown into a 
fever when he should be left coolly to think.* But who can 
read these opinions of Mr. Jay, and not commiserate rather 
than condemn Dr. Johnson. The words of this aged and 
venerable minister have a vast effect upon thousands and 
thousands of persons of his way of thinking in general on 
religious matters ; and, we may ask, should not these persons 

* I remember reading in a dissenting piiblication (1848), of the 
death of a young person under such circumstances, and indeed I believe 
the instances to be not uncommon. In this case, there was so much 
prayer, shouting, singing, &c., so much the more renewed whenever the 
poor patient seemed to relapse into a tranquil state of body or mind, 
that really she had scarcely time to commune with herself and be still : 
she was forced into an unnatural excitement, and probably her end was 
hastened, and her soul by no means improved, by such injudicious and 
unnecessary proceedings. 



FEAR OF DEATH. 363 

apply them to the cases of fear of death in those who usually 
think differently from Mr. Jay and themselves ? and hence 
these religious persons are bound no more severely to upbraid 
Dr. Johnson, than to find fault with one of their own com- 
munion. And when they recall to their memories the natu- 
ral temperament of Dr. Johnson, they will be the more 
inclined to pass a merciful judgment. For, as Mr. Jay re- 
marks, there is " the case of constitutional malady. In this 
condition our heavenly bard died : and we have known others 
who have died under a physical depression, with which relig- 
ious encouragements have contended in vain. But though 
their end was not peace in the exit, it was peace in the issue. 
Their des'pondency did not affect their right to the tree of 
life. They condemned themselves, but God delighted m 
them. And what an exchange ; what a surprise did such 
sufferers experience I They departed, expecting to awake in 
torment, and found themselves in Abraham's bosom I They 
left the world in a momentary gloom, and entered into ever- 
lasting sunshine I" We should feel very thankful for these 
sentiments : most thankful to know that a minister of Christ's 
gospel can conscientiously give deliberate utterance to them. 
Men do not rush, then, upon their promised inheritance of 
glory, because not only a love of life is implanted in them, 
but because also the fear of death, though mitigated, is not 
extirpated by feelings of rational certainty as to the future 
destination of their souls. And, in addition to this, there is 
the love of our fellow-creatures in this present world. This 
forms a very strong tie to the present life. The poor man 
whom we picture as longing to enter upon his wordly estate, 
would probably fling that estate to the winds if he was told 
that for twenty or thirty years after he was in possession, his 
wife and family would be living in utter destitution. A man 
knows that his family are dependent on his labor ; that not 
only sustenance of body, but independence of mind, and pro- 
tection from assaults and sneers of the world are theirs so 
long as he is alive and in health ; but that when once he lies 
on the bed of sickness, or sinks into the grave, all these 
comforts are most probably, if not quite certainly, over and 
past for thera. Oh, what foreboding thoughts will almost 



364 CLOSE OF DR. JOHiNSON'S LIFE. 

invariably cast a gloom on the days of his departing life ! 
And even where maintenance is not involved, how must we 
feel the pain and grief that our departure gives to dear friends ! 
This is far more difficult to bear than any sufferings of our 
own ; and we have known something of its bitterness during 
the grief of previous farewells I How when we take leave 
of dearest friends are we pondering on their sorrow, their loss 
of our individual presence which we know gave delight, and 
how do we picture their dreariness and wretchedness, and 
thereby magnify our own immeasurably ! * What then must 
be our sensation on the death-bed, when we have evidence 
all around of the grief we are causing to others, and even only 
for the heart's joy of these, would give worlds to arise ixp fx'om 
that couch of death, and walk among them cheerfully as in 
olden times. Every man will assign this feeling as a cause 
preventing joyfulness in, or longing for death : and the great 
consolation in this trying hour consists in a firm belief of our 
reunion with all our friends in the presence of God and the 
Lamb hereafter. The man who commits suicide is commonly 
one who feels he can no longer be a benefit to his family and 
friends, or who thinks himself deserted by friends, but the 
vast bulk of mankind are influenced by the contrary knowl- 
edge and experience ; and blessed be God, that we may be 
allowed to acknowledge ourselves bound by these earthly ties, 
that we may cherish the desire to remain in this world, with- 
out, by such feelings, becoming apprehensive of being charged 
with fault or offense before God, and endangering the safety 
of our souls when our time comes : still believing with St. 
Paul, that to die, whenever it happens, may be gain. Mr. 
Jay felt that Christians must commonly have those fears and 
vegrets in the contemplation of death, which have been men- 
tioned above : for he says, " The separation from weeping 

* Dr. Johnson, after saying that our sharpest sorrow arises from the 
loss of those we have loved with tenderness, remarks, " Friendship 
between mortals can be contracted on no other terms, than that one 
must some time mourn for the other's death;" and he feelingly adds, 
" This grief will always yield to the survivor one consolation propor 
tionate to his affliction ; for the pain, whatever it may be, that he himself 
feels, his friend has escaped^ — Rambler, No. 17. This number can 
not be too diligently read, as also Nos. 71, 78, and 203. 



BAR OF DEATH. 365 

friends, the pains, the groans, the dying strife, the destruction 
of the body, the consigning of it to the lowly grave, the con- 
version of it into food for worms, their immediate access into 
the presence of Purity and Holiness, the judgment that fol- 
lows after, doubts of their acceptance with God, uncertainties 
about their future state, is there not enough here to try all 
their confidence and courage ?" 



CHAPTER XXII. 

CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE— HIS CALMNESS IN 
DEATH. 

Many persons are fearful only of the bodily pang of death. 
This is the ignobler fear : and hence we find that criminals, 
and others who have no acute sense of religion, when they 
once from surrounding circumstances and sensations overcome 
this fear, have nothing else to call forth or stimulate that 
passion. We are told of a king of France (Louis IX.) who 
had a great fear of the physical pain of death. He once 
stopped a priest, who, after praying for the welfare of his 
body, was commencing prayer for the salvation of his soul. 
" Hold, hold," cried the king, " you have gone far enough 
for once. Never be tiresome in your address to God Almighty. 
Stop now, and pray for my soul another time." One of his 
physicians, Jacques Costier, governed him through this fear. 
He was used to say, "One of these days you will send me 
packing, I suppose, as I have seen you act by your other 
servants : but, mark my words, if you do, you will not live 
eight days after it." The king not only kept him about his 
majesty's person, but loaded him with gifts in order to appease 
his menaces. V Doctor Johnson's fear was, as we must per- 
ceive, wholly connected with the state after death, as involved 
in the decree of Him who hath power to cast both body and 
soul into hell. 

He tells us this in the Rambler:* "Milton," he says, 
" has judiciously represented the father of mankind as seized 
with horror and astonishment at the sight of death, exhibited 
to him on the Mount of Vision. For, surely, nothing can so 
much disturb the passions or perplex the intellects of man as 
the disruption of his union with visible nature : a separation 
from all that has hitherto delighted or engaged him : a change 
* No. 78. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 3G7 

not only of the place, but of the manner of his being : an 
entrance into a state not simply which he knows not, but 
which perhaps he has not faculties to know : an immediate 
and perceptible communication with the Supreme Being, and, 
what is above all distressful and alarming, the final sen- 
tence, and unalterable allotment ^ It is this that causes 
the dying terrors of persons eminent for piety and innocence,* 
while the stupid, the ignorant, and the brutal exhibit no 
concern : it is this which, though death may, through its 
forgetfulness, be defied in the field, often brings fear whea it 
approaches the bed of sickness in its natural horror. f 

At length he who had adopted the proverb of Solon, 
Keep thine eye fixed upon the end of life, as also another 
saying of one of the ancients, that death is of dreadful things 
the most dreadful: he who himself said,| "He that con- 
siders how soon he must close his life, will find nothing 
of so much importance as to close it well ;" and again, 
although he thought it injurious § to be always pondering 
upon death, "to neglect at any time preparation for death, is 
to sleep on our post at a siege, but to omit it in old age, is 
to sleep at an attack ;"ll he who with all his gloomy terrors 
of death, yet thought all earthly reputation to be a meteor, 
and. that no one ray of comfort could issue from this world 
to cheer the gloom of the last hour, and said,T[ that when all 
failed, " futurity has still its prospects ; there is yet happi- 
ness in reserve, which, if we transfer our attention to it, will 
support us in the pains of disease, and the languor of decay," 
and that this happiness might be attained by all that sin- 
cerely desired and earnestly pursued it, therefore on it alone, 
as beyond the power of chance, every mind ought finally to 
rest — we shall now see how he comported himself, when, at 
an advanced age, the silver cord must be loosed, the golden 
bowl be broken, when 'inan goeth to his long home, and the 
mourners go about the streets. 

* Rambler, No. 31. 

t No. 203. See also Nos. 28 and 29. X No. 17. 

S He said to Boswell, " If one was to think constantly of death, the 
business of life would stand still." 

il Rambler, No. 78. H Ibid. No. 203. 



368 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

THE DEATH OF DR. JOHNSON. 

The circumstances most to be noted in connection with 
the last days of this great and good man are those which 
relate to his piety, his prayers, his advice to friends, his ulti- 
mate calmness in death. On the 20th day of November, 
1784, Mr. Hoole, whose account is a very interesting one, 
found him very ill, and greatly depressed in spirits. But, 
hke David, when in dejection, he thought upon the Lord. 
" We had," says Mr. H., " a most afi'ecting conversation on the 
subject of religion, in which he exhorted me, with the greatest 
warmth of kindness, to attend closely to every religious duty, 
and particularly enforced the obligation of private prayer and 
receiving the sacrament." He lamented his own neglect of 
reading the Bible (though, as we have seen, he was often 
engaged in its perusal), and conjured Mr. Hoole to read and 
meditate upon it, and not to throw it aside for a play or 
novel. 

His own belief in the Sacred Scriptures we know to be 
firm. Some days after, he said to Mr. Windham, " For 
revealed religion there was such historical evidence, as, upon 
any subject not religious, would have left no doubt." And 
again, with respect to evidence, he observed, " We had not 
such evidence that Csesar died in the capitol, as that Christ 
died in the manner related." 

He pressed Mr. Hoole to remain that night, and join in 
prayer with him. He begged him repeatedly to let his 
present situation have due effect upon him, and Mr. H. 
writes, " He said many things that I can not now recollect, 
but all delivered with the utmost fervor of religious zeal and 
personal afiection." His servant Francis then came up, and 
Dr. Johnson said they would all go to prayers, on which they 
knelt by his bedside, while he repeated several prayers with 
great devotion. 

On the next day Mr. Hoole called, and found him more 
cheerful, and he put into Mr. H.'s hands a little book by 
Fleetwood on the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, which he 
said he had been the means of introJacing to the University 
of Oxford. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 3C9 

On the five following days Mr. Hoole called, and on the 
27th he went to the Rev. Mr. Strahan's of Islington, sufi'er- 
ing greatly from asthma, and there he seems to have made 
his will, which is dated, as being signed and sealed, December 
the 7th. This document, we may observe, is remarkable for 
the evidence it afibrds, in few words, of the testator's faith, 
hope, and charity. His faith and hope will be seen at once 
by the introductory declaration, thus written : " In the name 
of God. Amen. I, Samuel Johnson, being in full possession 
of my faculties, but fearing this flight may put an end to 
my life, do ordain this my last will and testament. / be- 
queath to God a sold polluted by many sins, but I hope 
purified by^ Jesus ChHst ;" and his charity is proved by the 
nature of the will itself, especially in the cases of Mr. Innys 
and his servants, together with the codicil attached, which 
bears date of December 9th. / 

There has been a discussionWespecting the sense in which. 
Dr. Johnson used the word " polluted," and it has been con- 
tended, from his former mention of the term, that he did not 
intend it to be taken in its extreme application : but the 
controversy is not worth a moment's consideration, and let us 
rather hope that he did wish to use it in its utmost strength 
of meaning, although we know that he was often harassed 
with mere scruples of conscience, and made it a part of a 
solemn prayer, that he " might overcome and suppress vain 
scruples." 

Several months before, in a conversation with Sir John 
Hawkins, he reasoned thus on the estimation of his offenses : 
" Every man knows his own sins, and also what grace he 
has resisted. But to those of others, and the circumstances 
under which they were committed, he is a stranger ; he is, 
therefore, to look on himself as the greatest sinner that he 
knows of." And at the conclusion of this argument, which 
he strongly enforced, he uttered this passionate exclamation : 
" Shall I, who have been a teacher of others, myself be a 
castaway I" The next day after this conversation he spent 
in fasting, humiliation, and such other devotions as became a 
man dangerously ill, having, in order to prevent interruption, 
told his servant Frank not to admit any one to him ; and 

Q* 



370 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

the better to enforce the charge, had added these awful words, 
" For your master is preparing himself to die !" 

On Sunday the 28th of November, Mr. Iloole and others 
were with him. Hearing that Mrs. Hoole was in the next 
room, he desired to see her, and receiving her with great 
affection, took her by the hand, and said, " I feel great 
tenderness for you ; think of the situation in which you see 
me, profit by it, and God Almighty keep you, for Jesus 
Christ's sake. Amen." Upon Mr. Hoole almost im- 
mediately saying, that Dr. Heberden would be with him that 
morning, his answer was, " God has called me, and Dr. 
Heberden comes too late." 

The Rev. Dr. Taylor of Ashbourn read prayers with him ; 
and Mr. Hoole and Mr. Sastres (an Italian master) remained 
with him for the evening. To the latter, after some kind 
words about his profession, he said, " Let me exhort you 
always to think of my situation, which must one day be 
yours : always remember that life is short, and that eternity 
never ends I I say nothing of your religion (Roman 
Catholic) ; for if you conscientiously keep to it, I have little 
doubt but you may be saved : if you read the controversy, I 
think we have the right on our side ; but if you do not read 
it, be not persuaded from any worldly consideration to alter 
the religion in which you were educated : change not, but 
from conviction of reason." 

With what genuine liberality and honesty of mind did he 
speak I He then most strongly enforced the motives of virtue 
and piety from the consideration of a future state of reward 
and punishment, and concluded with, " Remember all this, 
and God bless you !" 

On this evening Sir John Hawkins saw him. His disso- 
lution was a subject of fear to him. He was dozing, and 
waking up among his friends, said, " You see the state in 
which I am : conflicting with bodily pain and mental distrac- 
tion while you are in health and strength, labor to do good, and 
avoid evil, if ever you hope to escape the distress that now 
oppresses me." A little while after, he observed, " I had 
very early in my life, the seeds of goodness in me : I had a 
love of virtue, and a reverence for religion : and these, I trust, 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 371 

have brought forth in me fruits meet for repentance : and 
if I have re2oented as I ought, I am forgiven." Yes, when 
we think of the prescience of the eternal Mind, he was 
authorized, without the common feelings of presumption, in 
speaking thus in the present tense, seeing that he spoke con- 
ditionally and not absolutely. He continued, " I have at 
times entertained a loathing of sin and of myself, particularly 
when I had the prospect of death before me : and this has 
not abated when my fears of death have been less : and at 
these times I have had such rays of bope shot into my soul, as 
have almost persuaded me that I am in a state of reconcilia- 
tion with God." Who can say that the Almighty, in his gra- 
cious goodness, did not send these feelings into Dr. Johnson's 
soul, for the purpose of cheering and comforting one too de- 
pressed, but not with the intention that they should be re- 
ceived as his fiat of forgiveness. A weaker or more enthu- 
siastic mind would have made more of these than it might 
be warranted to do, *but Johnson knew too well the fallacious 
nature of impressions, and therefore would receive them with 
more of thankfulness than presumption. Yet, we speak as 
worms, for how know we the mind of God ? We can only 
be guided by His word, which tells us of forgiveness of all 
sins on worthy repentance and faith, and of these availing us 
in the day of judgment through the atonement of our blessed 
Redeemer. 

On the two following days Sir J. Hawkins found him 
more cheerful. On the 29th (Monday) Mr. Hoole called 
with his son, a clergyman, and Dr. Johnson appointed 
Wednesday for the latter to come and read the litany. On 
this day Sir Joshua Reynolds was with him, and then, or 
more probably on December 5th, he requested three things of 
the eminent artist, viz., to forgive him thirty pounds which 
he had borrowed of him, for he wanted to leave them to a 
distressed family : to read the Bible, especially not to omit 
doing so on a Sunday ; and never to use his pencil on a Sun- 
day. Sir Joshua, records Boswell, readily acquiesced ; while 
Mrs. H. More says, that he felt no difficulty except upon 
this last request, but that at length Sir Joshua gratified him 
in all. Dr. Johnson always reverenced the Sabbath, and 



379 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

on one occasion said to Hannah More, when importuned to 
speak well of an agreeable man, " Child," said he, " I will 
not speak any thing in favor of a Sabbath-breaker, to please 
you, nor any one else." 

On this evening he was much cheered by Mr. Langton 
(an accomplished scholar himself) reminding him of the gen- 
eral tendency of his writings and example — the Mr. Langton 
with whom he had been long intimate, and to whom he 
affectionately said, " Te teneam moriens deficiente manu." 
He had come to London, and taken private lodgings, on pur- 
pose to be with Dr. Johnson in his illness. 

On November 30th, Mr. Hoole, Mr. Langton, and others, 
were with him. He came from his chamber rather cheerful, 
and said to them, while they sat at their coffee, " Dear gen- 
tlemen, how do you do ?" He repeated a poem that he had 
written some years before. It was then that on opening a 
note brought by his servant, he said, " An odd thought 
strikes me ; we shall receive no letters in the grave." His 
•talk, says Mr. H., was in general very serious and devout, 
though occasionally cheerful : he said, "You are all serious 
men ;' I will tell you something. About two years since, I 
feared that I had neglected God, and that I had not a onind 
to give Him ; on which I set about to read Thomas a 
Kempis in Low Dutch, which I accomplished, and thence I 
judged that my mind was not impaired. Low Dutch having 
no affinity with any of the languages I knew." He seemed 
to think his recovery hopeless ; and Sir John Hawkins found 
him cheerful. 

On the Sunday following, the Sacrament was admmistered 
to him by the E-ev. Mr. Strahan. Several partook of the 
sacred elements with him. Previous to reading the exhort- 
ation, he knelt, and " with a degree of fervor," says Sir J. 
Hawkins, " that I never was witness to before, uttered the 
following eloquent and most energetic prayer : 

" ' Almighty and most merciful Father, I am now, as to 
human eyes it seems, about to commemorate for the last time 
the death of thy Son Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Redeemer. 
Grant, O Lord, that my whole hope and confidence may be 
m. His merits and in Thy mercy : forgive and accept my late 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 373 

conversion : enforce and accept ray imperfect repentance : 
make this commemoration of Him available to the confirma- 
tion of my faith, the establishment of my hope, and the en- 
largement of my charity ; and make the death of Thy Son 
Jesus effectual to my redemption. Have mercy upon me, 
and pardon the multitude of my offenses. Bless my friends ; 
have mercy upon all men. Support me by the grace of Thy 
Holy Spirit in the days of weakness, and at the hour of 
death, and receive me, at my death, to everlasting happiness, 
for the sake of Jesus Christ. Amen.' " 

May we not pronounce the above prayer to be as nearly 
perfect as we can conceive a prayer, suitable to this occasion, 
to be. It must have been premeditated ; its fullness and 
conciseness proclaim it as too good, and too exact, for an ex- 
temporaneous effusion. Like other of his prayers, it reminds 
us of the comprehensive and chastened quality of those in our 
Book of Common Prayer. No infidel could take such a 
prayer on his lips ; no hypocrite could utter it ; it is the 
prayer of the humble and sincere believer in the atonement 
of Jesus Christ, the only Saviour of the soul ; it is the peti- 
tion of one convinced that death is nigh, yet calm in the 
exercise of his reason, feeling that the almighty Mind must 
uphold and guide him to the last moment of his life. 

During the administration of this sacrament, he repeat- 
edly desired Mr. Strahan to speak louder ; seeming very 
anxious, says Mr. Hoole, not to lose any part of the service, 
in which he joined in very great fervor of devotion. Upon 
rising from his knees, he said that he dreaded to meet God 
in a state of idiocy, and that he had taken some opium to 
enable him to support the fatigue ; but he doubted if his ex- 
ertions were the genuine operations of his mind, and repeated 
from Bishop Taylor, this sentiment, " That little that has 
been omitted in health can be done to any purpose in sick- 
ness." 

On Mr. Ryland calling on him afterward, he remarked, 
" I have taken my viaticum ; I hope I shall arrive safe at 
the end of my journey, and be accepted at last." He spoke 
despondingly several times. Mr. Ryland comforted him, 
observing, that " we had great hopes given us." " Yes," he 



374 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

replied, " we have hopes given us ; but they are conditional, 
and I know not how far I have fulfilled those conditions." 
He afterward said, " However, I think that I have now cor- 
rected all bad and vicious habits." 

Often in the course of his illness he repeated the last con- 
cluding words of Izaak Walton's Life of Bishop Sanderson ; 
and, indeed, there were some important resemblances between 
him and this humble, sincere, and simple-hearted prelate. 

This Sunday evening was closed with prayer by Dr. John- 
son, in the most fervent and affecting manner, " his mind 
appearing wholly employed with the thoughts of another 
life." 

It was about this time that our dying hero, for we can call 
him nothing else, asked Dr. Brocklesby, whom he had en- 
deavored to confirm in the truths of Christianity, to tell him 
plainly whether he should recover. " Give me,'" he said, 
" a direct answer." The doctor having asked him if he 
could bear the whole truth, which way soever it might lead, 
and being answered that he could, declared that, in his opin- 
ion, he could not recover without a miracle. " Then," said 
Johnson, "I will take no more physic, not even my opiates ; 
for I have prayed that I may render up my soul to God un- 
clouded." If Johnson had not feared death, there would 
have been little bravery in this remark ; but, with his known 
fear of the last enemy, it shows exceeding fortitude. Many 
persons wish to be told when they are in extreme danger, 
but ^QW can bear the announcement when it is made. The 
late Queen Charlotte commanded Sir Herbert Taylor to in- 
form her expressly of the time when the doctors in consulta- 
tion gave up hopes of her recovery. He did so; and with 
some earnestness she exclaimed in alarm, " Sir Herbert has 
signed my death-warrant." It was evident that the intelli- 
gence hastened her end. 

The Rev. Dr. Arnold, when seized with illness, fixed his 
eyes upon the physician, and asked whether an attack of 
that nature was not always fatal. The physician declared 
there was something in his earnest look that made him feel 
that he could not tell him a lie for the whole world ; at once, 
therefore, he told him of his danger, and the doctor repeated 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 375 

texts of Scripture, and set about dying with extraordinary 
composure. 

It is pleasing to know, that at this time a good report of 
Dr. Johnson prevailed without. Hannah More had observed 
of him a few months before, that " he was very ill, and 
looked so dreadfully, that it quite grieved me. He is more 
mild and complacent than he used to be. His sickness 
seems to have softened his mind, without at all weakening it. 
I was struck with the mild radiance of this setting sun." 
Now she says : " Poor dear Johnson, he is past all hope. 
The dropsy has brought him to the point of death ; his legs 
are scarified, but nothing will do. I have, however, the 
comfort to hear that his dread of dying is in a great measure 
subdued ; and now he says, ' the bitterness of death is past.' 
How delighted should I be," she adds, " to hear the dying 
discourse of this great and good man, especially now that 
faith has subdued his fears. I wish I could see him." 

To Dr. Brocklesby, Johnson said : " Doctor, you are a 
worthy man, but I am afraid you are not a Christian ! 
What can I do better for you than offer up in your presence 
a prayer to the great God, that you may become a Christian 
in my sense of the word ?" Instantly he fell on his knees 
and put up a fervent prayer. When he got up, he caught 
hold of his hand, with great earnestness, and cried, " Doctor, 
you do not say. Amen." After a pause, he cried, Amen I 
Johnson said, " My dear doctor, believe a dying man ; there 
is no salvation but in the sacrifice of the Lamb of God. Go 
home, write down my prayer, and every word I have said, 
and bring it to me to-morrow." Brocklesby did so;* and 
Johnson bade him keep it in his own custody as long as he 
lived. 

This account of Dr. Johnson is related by Dr. Brocklesby : 
" For some time before his death, all his fears, were calmed 
and absorbed by the prevalence of his faith, and his trust in 
the merits and propitiation of Jesus Christ. 

" He talked often to me about the necessity of faith in the 
sacrifice of Jesus, as necessary beyond all good works what- 
ever for the salvation of mankind. 

* Life of Hannah More, vol. ii. p. 393. 



376 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

" He pressed me to study Dr. Clarke and to read his ser- 
mons. I asked him why he pressed Dr. Clarke, an Arian. 
' Because,' said he, ' he is fullest on the lyro'pitiatory sacri- 

We find this subject alluded to iu his conversation with 
others. On December 7th, Mr. Windham called upon him, 
and talked much with him. He presented the statesman 
with a copy of the New Testament, saying, " Extremum hoc 
munus morientis habeto." He requested him earnestly to 
become a protector to his servant, Francis Barber, and as a 
pledge of his kind guardianship, desired him to take his serv- 
ant by the hand, while he (Dr. Johnson) repeated the recom- 
mendation he had just made, and Mr. Windham's promise 
to attend to it. Thus was Johnson faithful to the last to 
the poor and friendless, and Mr. Windham no less declared 
by his willing compliance his own acknowledged manliness 
of mind.* 

Next ensued discourse upon the evidence for revealed 
religion, which we have related before. Of proofs to be 
derived from history, one of the most cogent, he seemed to 

* For example of this, see Mr. Windham's published speeches in 
Parliament, delivered in the House of " Ciinabs" (Commons), under 
the disguised name of " Gumdahm;" at least so was it in Dr. Johnson's 
days. Windham was one of the most eloquent of that respectable body 
of patriots that leagued together against Sir R. Walpole ; who, while 
almost all the men of wit and genius opposed him, is said to have paid 
in vain above fifty thousand pounds to paltry scribblers in his defense. 

An anecdote illustrative of a curious notion of liberty, is told in con- 
nection with Mr. Windham's name. " A Surrey magistrate told a 
friend of mine yesterday," says Wilberforce, "that some people met 
for a boxing match, and the magistrates proceeding to separate them, 
they threw their hats into the air, and declaring Mr. Windham had 
defended boxing in Parliament, cried out, ' Windham and Liberty.' A 
strange and novel association, by the way." 

But Wilberforce could appreciate Windham's talent. On a visit to 
Fellrigg, he turned over with great interest in its library many of the 
books, which were "full of Windham's marks." "Windham's mind," 
he said, " was in the last degree copious ; the soil was so fertile, scratch 
where you pleased, up came white clover. He had many of the true 
characteristics of a hero, but he had one great fault as a statesman — 
he hated the popular side of any question." How different to this is 
the manner of some statesmen of the present day. See "Memoirs of 
Wilberforce," by his Sons. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 377 

think, was the opinion so well authenticated, and so long 
entertained, of a deliverer that was to appear about that 
time. Among the typical representations, the sacrifice of 
the Paschal Lamb, in which no bone was to be broken, had 
early struck his mind. He implored Mr. Windham to keep 
holy the Sabbath-day. After alluding to the manifold and 
deep engagements of his political life, he said, that he did 
not condemn civil employment, but that it was a state of 
great danger, and that he had therefore one piece of advice 
earnestly to impress upon him, that he would set apart every 
seventh day for the care of his soul. " Such a portion of 
time," he remarked, " was surely little enough for the medita- 
tion of eternity." He himself loved to read only theological 
books on a Sunday, yet he was far from keeping the Pharisee's 
Sabbath, and once said admirably, on some person denouncing 
another for some lesser observance of the sacred day, "Who- 
ever loads life with unnecessary scruples, provokes the atten- 
tion of others on his conduct, and incurs the censure of sin- 
gularity, without reaping the reward of superior virtue." 

On this day, both Sir J. Hawkins and Mr. Hoole visited 
him. The former says, that Johnson wished an operation 
to be performed, and on Dr. Brocklesby saying that the sur- 
geon was the best judge of that, he replied, " How many men 
in a year die through the timidity of those whom they con- 
sult for health I I want length of life, and you fear giving 
me pain, ivhich I care not for.'' Three days before, he 
had told Sir John that he was easier in his mind, and as fit 
to die that instant as he could be a year hence. Mr. Hoole 
found him in good spirits. 

On December 8 th, Mr. Hoole found him very poorly and 
low, after a bad night. The E-ev. Mr. Hoole, who had been 
unremittingly attentive, read the litany, Dr. Johnson urging 
him to speak louder, while he himself made the responses in 
a deep and sonorous voice. After prayers, Mr. Langton 
came in, and much serious discourse followed. He warned 
all to profit by his situation, and exhorted Mr. Hoole to lead 
a better life than he had done. "A better life than you, my 
dear sir I" exclaimed Mr. H. Johnson replied warmly, 
" Don't compliment me now." He told Mr. Langton that 



378 . CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

he had on the night before enforced on (evidently Mr. 

Windham) a powerful argument to a powerful objection 
against Christianity. 

He then spoke on the Jews denying Christ, yet, after his 
death, raising a numerous church. Again he said, that he 
had always been struck with the resemblance of the Jewish 
passover and the Christian doctrine of redemption. 

On this day. Sir J. Hawkins found him dictating another 
will. After it was done, he desired Mr. Strahan to say the 
Lord's Prayer, and then added some extemporaneous ejacu- 
lations of a pious kind. 

Of the next three days nothing particular is recorded. He 
was in pain, and preserved his piety throughout. On the 9th 
Sir J. Hawkins found him composed and resigned. On the 
11th he told Mr. Hoole, who had recommended an irregular 
physician, famous for curing the dropsy, " It was too late for 
doctors, regular or irregular'' He said to Mr. Crickshanks, 
his medical man, " Come, give me your hand ;" and having 
shaken it, added, " You shall make no other use of it now ;" 
meaning, he should not examine his legs. 
">C On December 12 th Mr. Windham called at half-past 
*s^en, P.M., and staid till after eleven, though chiefly in the 
outer room. It was his endeavor to prevail on Johnson to 
take more nourishment ; not, as he told him, " for the pur- 
pose of prolonging his life for a few hours or days," but that 
" he might preserve his faculties entire to the last moment." 
Johnson, however, resolute in his denial of opiates, or any 
thing of an inebriating nature, begged that there might be 
an end of this kind importunity. He then took leave of 
Windham, " with great fervor," says Mr. W., '« in words 
which I shall, I hope, never forget ; ' God bless you, my dear 
Windham, through Jesus Christ;' and concluding with a wish, 
' that we might share in some humble portion of that happiness 
which God might finally vouchsafe to repentant sinners.' "^ 
" These were the last words," adds Mr. Windham, " I 
ever heard him speak. I hurried out of the room with tears 
in my eyes, and more affected than I had ever been on any 
former occasion." Mr. Hoole tells us of this visit, and the 
Rev. Dr. Strahan was there a great length of time. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 379 

Mr. Windham called again, and heard of his state, and 
what he had been saying. Among other things, he insisted 
on the doctrine of an expiatory sacrifice, as the condition, 
without which there was no Christianity ; and urged in sup- 
port, the belief entertained in all ages, and by all nations, 
barbarous as well as polite. V 

From Mr. Windham's journal, the following entries are 
extracted : " December 13. Forty-five minutes past ten, p.m. 
While writing the preceding articles, I received the fatal 
account, so long dreaded, that Dr. Johnson was no more I 

" May those prayers which he incessantly poured from a 
heart fraught with the deepest devotion, find their acceptance 
with Jlim to whom they were addressed — which piety, so 
humble and so fervent, may seem to promise." 

" December 18. — For some days no work of any sort has 
been done. I can not, indeed, say that all the time has been 
misspent ; much of it has been employed in performing the 
last duties of respect and affection to the great man who is 
gone." 

" December 20th. — A memorable day ; the day which saw 
deposited in Westminster Abbey the remains of Johnson." 
Y On December 13th (1784), Mr. Hoole called, and found 
*him composed. A young lady, the daughter of an old friend, 
had been permitted to see him, that she might earnestly re- 
quest him to give her his blessing. The dying man turned 
himself in the bed, and said " God bless you, my dear I" 
These were the last words he spoke.* His difficulty of 
breathing increased till about seven o'clock in the evening, 
when Barber and Mrs. Desmoulins, who were sitting in the 
room, observing that the noise he had made in breathing had 
ceased, went to the bed, and found he was dead !" 

" We went into the chamber," says Mr. Hoole, " and 
there saw the most awful sight of Dr. Johnson laid out in 
his bed, without life." 

Thus died Dr. Johnson, physically tranquil, as one going 

* Sir J. Hawkins says, that, in his last moments, he uttered these 
words to Mr. Sastres, " Jam morituriis,^^ and at a quarter past seven, 
he had, without a groan, or the least sign of pain or uneasiness, yielded 
his last breath. 



380 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

off into a placid sleep. Nor was his mind, we may conceive, 
less composed. " He will not leave," exclaimed Hannah 
More, " an abler defender of religion and virtue behind him ; 
and he who so tenderly insisted on a year's widowhood in his 
Literary Club ere a successor to Garrick should be named, 
has himself nigh caused a continued widowhood in the world." 

Of his last days, Boswell's brother has made this record. 
«' The doctor, from the time he was certain his death was 
near, appeared to be perfectly resigned ; was seldom or never 
fretful or out of temper, and often said to his faithful servant, 
who gave me this account, ' Attend, Francis to the salvation 
of your soul, which is the object of greatest importance ;' he 
also explained to him passages in the Scripture, and seemed 
to have pleasure in talking on religious subjects." X 

The Honorable John Byng, in a letter to Mr. Malone, 
states, that he had a long conversation with Cawston, who 
sat up with Dr. Johnson the whole of Sunday night, and 
who says, that the doctor " was perfectly composed, steady 
in hope, and resigned to death. ... At the interval of each 
hour they assisted him to sit up in his bed, and move his 
legs, which were in much pain ; when he regularly addressed 
himself to fervent prayer ; and though sometimes his voice 
failed him, his sense never did, during that time. He said 
his mind was prepared, and the time to his dissolution seem- 
ed long. . . . Cawston says, that no man could appear more 
collected, more devout, or less terrified at the thoughts of the 
approaching minute." 

Sir John Hawkins writes (after saying, however heroic an 
undaunted death may appear, it is not what we should pray 
for), " As Johnson lived the life of the righteous, his end was 
that of a Christian : he strictly fulfilled the injunction of the 
Apostle, to work out his own salvation with fear and trem- 
bling ; and though his doubts and scruples were certainly 
very distressing to himself, they gave his friends a pious hope, 
that he who added to almost all the virtues of Christianity 
that religious humility which its great Teacher inculcated, 
will, in the fullness of time, receive the reward promised to 
a patient continuance in well-doing." 

We may well remember here some words of one his favor- 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 381 

ite religious authors :* " Courage and bravery," says Law, 
" are words of a great sound, and seem to signify an heroic 
spirit ; but yet, humiUty, which seems to be the lowest, 
meanest part of devotion, is a more certain argument of a 
noble and courageous mind." 

It was such humility which made Charles Simeon abhor 
from his inmost soul a death-bed scene, and bade him remem- 
ber how, the angels themselves vail their faces in the presence 
of the High and Holy One that inhabiteth eternity. It was 
such humility that led that eminent pastor, Jones of Nay- 
land, not to apply St. Paul's words t to himself, but rather 
only to repeat those words which our blessed Lord used to- 
ward the woman with the box of ointment — and as she made 
an oflering at the head of Christ, he would offer all he had 
at His feet I Joyous will it be for every man whose faith 
and work can justify a personal application of the simple an- 
nouncement, to be uttered by Divine voice only, He hath 
done what he could ! 

Hannah More tells us,t as informed by the Rev. Mr. 
Storry, of Colchester, that Dr. Johnson, not to be comforted 
by the ordinary topics of consolation addressed to him, desired 
to see a clergyman, and particularly described the views and 
character of the person whom he wished to consult. After 
some consideration, a Mr. Winstanley was named, and the 
doctor requested Sir John Hawkins to write a note in his 
name, requesting Mr. Winstanley' s attendance as a minister. 

Mr. Winstanley, s^ who was in a very weak state of health, 
was quite overpowered on receiving the note, and felt appalled 

* Law's Serious Call, p. 450. 

t See works of Rev. William Jones, M.A.. vol. i. p. 40. The words 
of St. Paul were those in 2 Tim. iv. 7, 8, and are alluded to in a brief 
and humble letter to a dear friend. 

X For this account see Memoirs of Hannah More, vol. i. p. 378, &c. 

k This was the Rev. Thomas Winstanley, Canon Residentiary of 
Peterborough, a Canon of St. Paul's, and Rector of St. Dunstan's in 
the East He was an excellent preacher, but a man of most reserved 
and retired manners. Notwithstanding his studious and peaceful habits, 
he on three occasions exerted himself to the utmost in public ; first, by 
advocating the cause of Admiral Byng, whom he considered unjustly 
condemned to death by the memorable court-martial ; secondly, by en- 
deavoring to save the life of Dr. Dodd, convicted of forgery ; and thirdly, 



382 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

by the very thought of encountering the talents and learning 
of Dr. Johnson. In his embarrassment, he went to his friend 
Colonel Pownall, and told him what had happened, asking at 
the same time for his advice how to act. The colonel, who 
was a pious man, urged him immediately to follow what ap- 
peared to be a remarkable leading of Providence, and for the 
time argued his friend out of his nervous apprehension : but 
after he had left Colonel Pownall, Mr. Winstanley's fear re- 
turned in so great a degree, as to prevail upon him to aban- 
don the thought of a personal interview with Dr. Johnson. 
He determined in consequence to write him a letter ; and 
part of that letter, as repeated by Mr. Storry to Hannah 
More, was as follows; 

«' Sir — I beg to acknowledge the nonor of your note, and 
am very sorry that the state of my health prevents my com- 
pliance with your request ; but ray nerves are so shattered, 
that I feel as if I should be quite confounded by your presence, 
and instead of promoting, should only injure the cause in 
which you desire my aid. Permit me, therefore, to write 
what I should wish to say were I present. I can easily con- 
ceive what would be the subjects of your inquiry. I can 
conceive that the views of yourself have changed with your 
condition, and that on the near approach of death, what you 
once considered mere peccadilloes have risen into mountains 
of guilt, while your best actions have dwindled into nothing. 
On whichever side you look, you see only positive transgres- 
sions or defective obedience ; and hence, in self-despair, are 
eagerly inquiring, ' What shall I do to be saved ?' I say to 
you, in the language of the Baptist, ' Behold the Lamb of 
God !' " &c. 

"When Sir John Hawkins came to this part of Mr. Win- 
by advocating the repeal of the laws against the Jews, disabling them 
from the exercise of civil rights. He was the author of the " Christiaa 
Calling," and of " Meditations," and in his latter days he had a strong 
leaning to what were called Evangelical principles. 

He married the widow of Colonel Braithwaite ; and I may be per- 
mitted to mention that the writer of this book is his great-grandson. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 383 

Stanley's letter, Dr. Johnson interrupted him, anxiously ask- 
ing, ''Does he say so? Read it again I Sir John." Sir 
John complied ; upon which Dr. Johnson said, " I must see 
that man ; write again to him." A second note was accord- 
ingly sent ; but even this repeated solicitation could not prevail 
over Mr. Winstanley's fears. He was led, however, to write 
again to the doctor, renewing and enlarging upon the subject 
of his first letter ; and these communications, together with 
the conversation of the late Mr. La Trobe, who was a partic- 
ular friend of Dr. Johnson, appear to have been blessed by 
God in bringing this great man to a renunciation of self, and 
a simple reliance on Jesus as his Saviour, thus also communi- 
cating to him that peace which he had found the world could 
not give, and which, when the world was fading from his 
view, was to fill the void, and dissipate the gloom, even of 
the valley of the shadow of death. 

If this account be a true one, and if the letters of Mr. 
Winstanley were blessed to Dr. Johnson's soul, we have no 
reason to deplore his non-attendance ; only remarking that 
such non-attendance was inexcusable save and except on the 
valid plea of ill-health and shattered nerves. Dr. Johnson, 
from the description evidently given him of this clergyman, 
would have expected much instruction and consolation from 
his presence ; and it would have been sad, if, from bodily 
weakness, the powers of his mind had forsaken him ; but still 
a minister of God is to go forth in prayer and hope, and ven- 
ture to trust that strength will be granted him sufficient for 
the important duty he has undertaken in all humility. 

Every clergyman may with propriety recollect, that the 
preparation for the future life is quite a different matter from 
the possession of great talents in the present time. Wilber- 
force speaks of the poem entitled the " Curse of Kehama," 
and describes it thus : " Imagination as wild as the winds ; 
prodigious command of language, and the moral purity truly 
sublime ; the finest ideas all taken from the Scriptures ; " 
and he continues afterward, " Oh ! what a consideration is it, 
that magnificent as are the visions of glory in which Southey's 
fancy revels, and which his creative genius forms, they are 
all beneath the simple reality of the Christian's hope, if he be 



384 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

but duly impressed with it." Yes, truly, the Christian's hope 
is a simple, as it is a humbling possession : and the clergyman 
who should attend at the last on a Johnson or a Southey, 
need not be as profound in learning as the one, or as sublime- 
ly poetical as the other ; neither would they themselves desire 
such qualities in their spiritual comforters, if their greatness 
be tempered with humility. The pastor is commissioned to 
open the Word of God, which is so far superior to any words 
of man ; and from this he is authorized to draw his sublime 
yet simple lesson, a lesson which is not effectual unless it 
tend to debase the vanity of human talent, and tarnish every 
proud thought of moral excellence. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

CONCLUSION.— CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

We have noAV only to take a very brief review of Dr. 
Johnson's character, and of his death. All men that are in 
any degree acquainted vi^ith English literature, have heard the 
name of Dr. Johnson, and have perused his Works. He, 
like other foremost vi^riters, had a style of his own — dangerous 
to imitate, and not, but for the excellence attained, and the 
weight of the moral sentiments conveyed by it, altogether 
acceptable for the improvement of our literature. He used 
to say of Addison, " He is the Raphael of Essay writers . " 
and yet he himself in no way endeavored to adopt the elegant 
simplicity, and more idiomatic manner of Addison's writing. 
Johnson will always be regarded as the very antipodes of 
Addison. " Addison," says Murphy,* " lends grace and 
ornament to truth ; Johnson gives it force and energy. 
Addison makes virtue amiable ; Johnson represents it as an 
awful duty. Addison insinuates himself with an air of 
modesty : Johnson commands like a dictator ; but a dicta- 
tor in his splendid robes, not laboring at the plow. Addi- 
son is the Jupiter of Virgil, with placid serenity talking to 
Venus : 

" Vultu quo coelura tempestatesque serenat." 

Johnson is Jupiter Tonans ; he darts his lightning, and rolls 
his thunder, in the cause of virtue and piety. The language 
seems to fall short of his ideas ; he pours along, familiarizing 
the terms of philosophy, with bold inversions, and sonorous 
periods : but we may apply to him what Pope has said of 
Homer : " It is the sentiment that swells and fills the dic- 

* From an Essay on the Life and Genius of Dr. Johnson, bj' Arthur 
Murphy, Esq., a continued friend of Johnson's, and a member of the 
Essex Head Club 

R 



38G CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

tion, which rises with it, and forms itself about it ; like glass 
in the furnace, which grows to a greater magnitude, as the 
breath Mathin is more powerful, and the heat more intense." 
We may well think what those ideas must be, of which John- 
son's language, so solemn, and so magnificent, falls short in 
the expression. 

Another contemporary * alludes more particularly to the 
kindness and goodness that swayed Johnson's pen. After 
speaking of his poem " Irene," he says, " Together with the 
ablest head, he seems possessed of the very best heart at 
present existing. Every line, every sentiment that issues 
from his pen, tends to the great centre of all his views, the 
promotion of virtue, religion and humanity ; nor are his actions 
less pointed toward the same great end. Benevolence, charity, 
and piety are the most striking features in his character ; and 
while his writings point out to us what a good man ought to 
be, his own conduct sets us an example of what he is." It 
may be mentioned, that it is thought to be rather an instance 
of Johnson's jealousy, that when his intimate friend, Dr. 
Hawksworth, published his "Almoran and Hamet," Dr. John- 
son, being asked if he had read the book, replied, as it is re- 
ported, "No ! I like the man too well to read his book." It 
is very easy to give another and kinder interpretation to these 
words. Johnson was not jealous. "Little people," he says, 
"are apt to be jealous : but they should not be jealous ; for 
they ought to consider, that superior attention will necessa- 
rily be paid to fortune or rank." Goldsmith was jealous on 
several occasions ; but when it was intimated to Burke that 
some of the company, at a particular gathering, would as soon 
have heard him talk as have listened to Dr. Johnson, "Oh, no," 
said Burke, "it is enough for me to have rung the bell to 
him." 

Alexander Chalmers depicts Johnson's rising in the world,! 
ixnder the disadvantages of obscure birth and unprepossessing 
appearance and manners, as significative of the large powers 
within. " That such a man," he says, after setting forth 
some adverse qualities, " should have forced his way into the 

* David Er.skine Baker, Esq., in Biographia Dramatica. 
t Chalmers's Biographical Dictionary, vol. xix. p. 74. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 387 

society of a greater number of eminent characters than per- 
haps ever gathered round an individual ; that he should not 
only have gained but increased their respect to a degree of 
enthusiasm, and preserved it unabated for so long a series of 
years ; that men of all ranks in life, and of the highest degree 
of mental excellence, should have thought it a duty, and 
found it a pleasure, not only to tolerate his occasional rough- 
ness, but to study his humor, and submit to his control, to 
listen to him with the submission of a scholar, and consult 
him with the hopes of a client — all this surely afibrds the 
strongest presumption that such a man was remarkable be- 
yond the usual standard of human excellence." Johnson may 
have indeed been rough in personal appearance and occasional 
manners, but the world around him seems to have been of 
the same opinion with Bishop Home,* when he so happily 
remarked of our literary hero, " To reject wisdom, because 
the person of him who communicates it is uncouth, and his 
manners are inelegant ; what is it, but to throw away a fine 
apple, and assign for a reason the roughness of its coat ?" 

But we must recollect, that it was not only Dr. Johnson's 
intellect that invested him with the attractive powers de- 
scribed by Chalmers, but it was his religion also that endeared 
him to contemporary friends, and that will carry his name 
with honor and veneration to remotest posterities. No man 
more thoroughly exhibited in his person the power of a fixed 
belief in Christianity combined with strong natural sense and 
intellectual vigor, and the beneficial influence such a com- 
bination has upon the individual, and through him, upon man- 
kind at large. In him was the union of Gospel light with 
intellectual light seen in more useful and efficient kind and 
degree than in our almost superhuman poet, Milton. It may 
be a question, indeed, whether Milton has done very much 
for the cause of religion, and whether the impersonation of 
Satan may not rather lead many minds into skepticism. But 
leaving such comparison, what a contrast is exhibited between 
Johnson and Voltaire. We find Johnson, throughout his 
whole career, swayed by the influence of fixed principles, 

* In an Essay in the "011a Podrida," by the E.ev. Dr. Home, the 
accomplished and pious Bishop of Norwich. 



388 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

acting consistently and conscientiously under great infirmities. 
The paralytic affection under which he labored prevented Mr. 
Budworth from engaging him as an assistant, when Budworth 
was Master of the Grammar School at Brewood, from a fear, 
he said, " lest the boys should ridicule him, or imitate him." 
The independence of his career at Oxford : the distress he en- 
countered at his outset in London, and the risk he ran, by 
his intimacy with Savage, of falling into vicious habits — the 
twenty-four years of severe labor and penury which he must 
have endured from the time that he left college until the 
period that his Dictionary was published — the melancholy 
produced and continued by his bodily affliction — and yet to 
know that during this time his filial piety, conjugal affection, 
kindnesses, charities, and a most noble independence of spirit, 
shone forth under every disadvantage and temptation ; this 
must command our admiration, our respect, and love. Vol- 
taire, endowed with fortune, station, easy temperament and 
genius of the first order — but destitute of religious feelings — 
living only to amuse and corrupt the world. Johnson in his 
humble dwelling living to instruct, exalt, and purify mankind. 
Johnson not leaving behind him a page or a sentence that 
deserved to be blotted out ; and Voltaire scarcely leaving a 
page worthy to be preserved as contributing to the welfare 
of his fellow-creatures. Such in Johnson was the power and 
benefit of Christian principles in union with intellectual tal- 
ents ; and well does an excellent writer of modern date,* 
observe, " If there be on earth a character to which we are 
justified in looking with feelings of awe and admiration, it is 
to that which has united the acquisitions of learning, phi- 
losophy, and high-minded literature, to the far more valuable 
accompaniments of humble Christian piety ; it is to the Mil- 
tons, the Pascals, the Newtons, the Lockes, the Addisons, the 
Johnsons : to men, who with a deeper insight into the 
mysteries of the material creation, into the various shades of 
the human character, and into the treasures of ancient litera- 
ture, than ever adorned the cause of infidelity, looked up to 
the holy fountain of truth only, that they might worship, and 

* Sermons on some of the Leading Principles of Christianity : by 
Bishop Shuttleworth. 1829. Second Edition. Serm. xviii. p. 498. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 389 

devote the whole efforts of their mighty minds to the service 
of the religion, of jnirity, and of humility /" Yes ; Shuttle- 
worth is right, such men as these advance the cause of you, 
O learned Andrewes ; O blessed Ken ; O holy Beveridge ; O 
wise and sagacious Leslie ; * and God be praised, your days 
are not past. 

In Johnson was strength of character. He was poor, very 
poor, for a long period of his life ; and even from the time of 
his obtaining his pension in the year 1763 (the year in which 
Boswell was introduced to him) to the day of his death, his 
circumstances, though easy, were not large, yet he never 
thrust forward this his poverty. He was not like Antisthenes, 
the affected philosopher, who was always, in company, turn- 
ing the threadbare side of his garment outward, and which 
drew the cutting sarcasm from the wise and good Socrates, 
when he said to him, " Wilt thou never cease to expose thy 
pride and vanity ?" No, his was the poverty that complained 
not, a courageous poverty, that rejects all aid and sympathy 
when itself can set to work. " Milton," he remarks,! in re- 
lating how the author of " Paradise Lost" also sought the 
ofHce of a schoolmaster, " was not a man who could become 
mean by a mean employment :" and such may be said of 
Johnson all through his life, that no mean style of living 
could ever make him mean in his mind or heart. Anecdotes 
have served much to illustrate this part of his character. 
He must have been in his sterner humor, when he replied to 
Boswell's inquiry where Knox was buried, •' I hope in the 
highway :" and when told that one of the steeples of ancient 
St. Andrews was in danger, wished it not to be taken down, 
" for," said he, " it may fall on some of the posterity of John 
Knox : and no great matter." But in a benignant and more 
usual mood, when, on its being said that Clarke was very 
wicked for going so much into the Arian system, he answer- 
ed, " I will not say he was wicked, he might be mistaken." 
See how he settles the character of the eloquent and highly 
gifted Lord Bolingbroke, the idol of Dean Swift, Pope, and 
many more : " Sir," he said, " Bolingbroke was a scoundrel 
and a coward : a scoundrel, for charging a blunderbuss against 

* See Jones's Works, vol. vi. p. 240. t In his Life of Milton. 



390 CLO«E OF DR. JOiLNSON'S LIFE. 

religion and morality : a coward, because he had not resolu- 
tion to fire it off himself, but left half-a-crown to a beggarly 
Scotchman to draw the trigger after his death." Of a more 
obscure person, who maintained there was no distinction be- 
tween virtue and vice, he, in a common sense way, said, 
" When he leaves our house, let us count our spoons." How 
prostrate does he lay (as has been already alluded to) the 
celebrated Lord Chesterfield, in the letter addressed to him 
after his Dictionary had appeared I What a quietus, too, he 
gave to Macpherson, the publisher of " Ossian," and to Soame 
Jenyns, "Ha, I thought I had given him enough of it I" 
And yet what a branding wit in this "great and venerable" 
character : for what said Garrick of this majestic teacher of 
moral and religious wisdom ? " Rabelais and all other wits," 
exclaimed the British Roscius, " are nothing compared with 
him. You may be diverted by them ; but Johnson gives you 
a forcible hug, and shakes laughter out of you, whether you 
will or no." Christianity seem.s to have so softened his rug- 
ged nature, as well as exalted it, that while he beat down 
the proud and the strong, he was the unflinching friend of the 
poor, the humble, and the weak. No man ever put in prac- 
tice more completely the sentiment, which so few have power 
to carry out, of that incomparable line of the Roman poet : 

" Parcere subjectts, et debellare superbos." 

See him in his own small house sheltering poor blind 
Mrs. Williams, poor Mrs. Desmoulins, poor Levett : and re- 
member all his kindness and condescension to Francis Barber. 
See him befriending in their distress the Rev. Dr. Dodd, 
Baretti, and others : and think of that weeping, and praying, 
and parting with Catharine Chambers. Look to the innu- 
merable Prefaces and Dedications to works of inferior authors, 
and his patience in correcting and counseling, yet scrupling 
not to tell a dunce that he was a dunce. See with what 
honest and hearty sympathy he befriended those who had 
labored under him in compiling his Dictionary. " Some of 
them," observes the Rev. J. S. M. Anderson,* " were engaged 

* Addresses on Miscellaneous Subjects ; address on Dr. Johnson, 
p. 87. By the Rev. James S. M. Anderson, of Brighton, 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 391 

ill literary undertakings on their own accomit ; some were 
sick and weakly in body ; all were poor. And in Johnson 
they all found a friend. He wrote for those to whom the 
service of his pen was useful ; he visited those who were ia 
sickness; yea, even out of his penury, he found means to 
alleviate the yet more pinching- agony of their distress." 
Though rough to a iew who required roughness, well might 
he be justified in saying, out of the promptings of the bene- 
volent heart within, " I wonder how I should have any ene- 
mies ; for I do harm to nobody."* Not only was his good 
nature manifest in the club room when crying out, " Who's 
for Poonsh?" but in the humble garret, or the chilling street, 
his charity was known. And like Melancthon, he could 
hold a book in one hand, and rock a cradle with the other: 
or, like Bishop Wilson, he could discourse moral thunder, 
and order penance and imprisonment, and yet be dohng out 
an assortment of spectacles to needy old women, f who blessed 
even the passing shadow of the man. 

His tour to the Hebrides shows him to have been a man 

* On Johnson saying this, Boswell immediately remarked to him, 
" In the first place, sir, you will be pleased to recollect that you set 
out with attacking the Scotch ; so you got a whole nation for your 
enemies." Johnson. — " Why, I own that by my definition of Oats I 
meant to vex them." Boswell — " Pray, sir, can you trace the cause 
of your antipathy to the Scotch ?" Johnson. — '"lean not, sir." Bos- 
well. — " Old Mr. Sheridan say.s, it was because they sold Charles the 
First." Johnson. — " Then, sir, old Mr. Sheridan has found out a very 
good reason." 

Johnson's definition of Oats was, " A grain which in England is 
generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people." Lord 
Elibank made a happy retort on this; "Yes," said he, "and where 
else will you see such horses and such men?" 

It was pleasant to Boswell, afterward, to find oats, the " food of 
horses" so much used as the "food of men" in Johnson's own town of 
Lichfield : there he saw oat ale, and oat cakes. 

Dr. Johnson gave greater cause of ofTense, we should think, when 
he compared the learning of the Scotch as being like to " Bread in a 
besieged town ; where every man gets a little, but no man gets a full 
meal." Yet he often complimented the Scotch clergy on their learn- 
ing and information ; and, at all events, his comparison would not apply 
in the present day. 

t See Hugh Stowell's Life of Bishop Wilson, p. 88. See Alexander 
Knox's Reraain-s, vol. ii. p. 301-304. 



392 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

of great enterprise and courage, notwithstanding his infirmi- 
ties, with a constant fear of God before his eyes. Thomson 
the poet, in London, could sing of rural scenes : but Johnson, 
whose heart was in London also, could travel into the rough 
places of the earth. Of one place in which he slept, he 
says, "I undressed myself, and felt my feet in the mire. The 
bed stood upon the bare earth, which a long course of rain 
had softened to a puddle."* He describes himself and party 
as always struggling with some obstruction or other : and 
we find him in places of which he says, any one might have 
wandered among the rocks till he had perished with hard- 
ship, before he could have found either food or shelter.! 
Yet he complained not : for instead of remembering his snug 
quarters in Bolt-court, or his love of contemplating the tide 
of human life in Fleet-street, he remarks, " Yet what are 
these hillocks to the ridges of Taurus, or these spots of wild- 
ness to the deserts of America ?" Boswell made an apposite 
remark on one occasion when Johnson was placed upon one 
of the ponies called shelties, just caught wild from the heath, 
with a straw halter put upon its head : " I wish, sir," said 
Bosw^ell, ''the club saw you in this attitude." At another 
time there was no saddle or bridle for the sheltie, hut only a 
halter, which made Dr. Johnson observe, that " he longed to 
get to a country of saddles and bridles." Yet, during all 
his difficulties and dangers, he behaved with great courtesy, 
and even delicacy, in the huts of the poorest persons : took 
pleasure in little things : noted down all the customs of the 
country : showed a minute knowledge of various arts : perused 
all the books he could get hold of : wrote Latin verses : ex- 

* Boswell gives us a picture of an itp-stairs room, which had some 
deals laid across the joists, as a kind of ceiling. There were two beds 
in the room, and a woman's gown was hung on a rope to make a cur- 
tain of separation between them. We had much hesitation, whether 
to undress, or to lie down with our clothes on. I said at last, "I'll 
plunge in ; there wmU be less harbor for vermin about me when I am 
stripped." Dr. Johnson said, he was like one hesitating whether to 
go into a cold bath. At last he resolved to go. I observed he might 
serve a campaign. Johnson. — " I could do all that can be done by 
patience; whether I should have strength enough, I know not." 

t His own account of his Journey, p. 88. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 393 

pressed many theological opinions : and fairly roughed it among 
a haughty people, tenacious of dignity ; one of whom asked 
him if he was one of the JoJmstons of Glencoe, or of Ardna- 
murchan I The author of the "Hambler" was as nobody. 

Dr. Johnson's religion was evangelical, though not accord- 
ing to the modern conventional meaning of that term. He 
was more Arminian than Calvinistic ; but we may best 
describe him as a man who looked for salvation, by the 
mercy of God, through faith in the atonement of our Lord 
Jesus Christ : and who would feel that good works were in- 
dispensable evidences of a genuine faith. Through the greater 
portion of his life religion was rather an awful than a pleas- 
urable matter in his mind, and hence Bishop Jebb has been 
led to remark,* " To multitudes that are both honest and 
serious, religion is not pleasurable : it is a thing to them 
unmixedly awful : they never dream of seeking recreation 
from it ; they hold it as a solemii, but rather painful duty, 
and they get away from it as soon as they can. Such people 
do not, and can not, taste the beauties of Scripture : yet they 
have real, though, doubtless imperfect faith. Doctor John- 
son was of this number : what he writes of the Paradise 
Lost, he would have said of Scripture, if reverence permit- 
ted ' Its perusal is a duty rather than a pleasure. We read 
Milton for instruction, retire harassed and over-burdened, and 
look elsewhere for recreation ; we desert our master and seek 
for companions.' But, by those whose faith is strong, whose 
religious views are bright and cheerful, &c. &c., of such men 
the sacred volume will become the chosen pleasure-ground." 

The late lamented Bishop Shirley, who was one of the 
best specimens of the (so called) evangelical school, also gives 
this opinion,! " I think that Johnson was an example of a 
man who was aiming at details rather than principles in 
religion. He was dissatisfied with the " corrupt fruit," and 
pruned the branches, and was still dissatisfied, because more 
corrupt fruit was again produced : and all was struggle, and 
sorrow, and bondage. He forgot that, as a Christian, he 

* Life of Bishop Jebb, Letter Ixvi. 

t Memoirs of Bishop Shirley, by Archdeacon Hill, p. 425. This is 
a pleasing memoir, tilled with refined sentiments. 



394 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

was not under the law, but under grace ; and it was not 
until that grace (the mercy of God in Christ) got possession 
of his soul, and drove him toM'ard God in harmony of mind, 
by its assimilating influence, that he had peace, or joy, or 
liberty, or spiritual power to have victory, and to triumph 
over the world, the flesh, and the devil." Dr. Shirley can 
not but allow that all was well at the last with Dr. John- 
son ; but neither he nor Bishop Jebb sufficiently remark on 
the constraining and directing power of his religious principles 
— for princijjles of the most influencing kind he undoubted- 
ly cherished in his heart of hearts. He was a great and 
awful man in every thing that he undertook — in conversation, 
in writing, in duty — and the same spirit that nerved him in 
these, accompanied him also in his religion ; which in him 
was real, was commanding, was lasting ; and if the garment 
was of sombre hue, its texture was enduring, and always fit 
for service. " The hope of the Christian was his," says the 
Rev. Mr. Anderson, " and its reality was then" (in his last 
illness) "proved." 

We have shown that his religion was in accordance with 
the spirit of the Church of England — humbling, yet edify- 
ing. In defense of written prayers he utters this admirable 
sense :* " It is now universally confessed, that men pray as 
they speak on other occasions, according to the general 
measure of their abilities and attainments. Whatever each 
may think of a form prescribed by another, he can not but 
believe that he can himself compose by study and meditation 
a better prayer than will rise in his mind at a sudden call : 
and if he has any hope of supernatural help, why may he 
not as well receive it when he writes as when he speaks ?" 
In his Sermons written for Dr. Taylor, we find most excel- 
lent sentiments and sterling sense ; sentiments and sense that 
in this our day are being revived ; t and if with moderation 

* In his " Journey to the Western Islands," p. 244. 

t We may be reminded of a smart epigram in this place — 

" The antiquarian's skill, how bright ! 

Who out of darkness formeth light : 

And makes this contradiction true, 

That something old is something new. 

Gentleman'' s Magazine^ 1 782, p. 40. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 393 

and discretion, can not fail to strengthen the hands of the 
church and her sound and genuine Christianity. How 
wisely does he speak of the study of antiquity ! " The 
study of antiquity is laborious, " he says,* " and to despise 
what we can not, or will not understand, is a much more 
expeditious way to reputation." Again : " With regard to 
the order and government of the Primitive church, we may 
doubtless follow their (the Ancient Christians') authority with 
perfect security ; they could not possibly be ignorant of laws 
executed, and customs practiced, by themselves ; nor would 
they, even supposing them corrupt, serve any interests of their 
own, by handing down false accounts to posterity. We are 
therefore to inquire from them, the different orders established 
in the ministry from the Apostolic ages : the different employ- 
ments of each, and their several ranks, subordinations, and 
degrees of authority. From their writings, ive are to vin- 
dicate the establishmeyit of our church, and by the same 
writings are those ivho differ from us, in these particulars, 
to defend their conduct T Yes ; to this touchstone we must 
come to seek for the practical in proof of the speculative. 
And how wholesome is this rule, and most confounding to 
the Church of Rome ; " Every thing that was declared by 
the inspired writers to be necessary for salvation, must have 
been carefully recorded, and therefore what we find no traces 
of in the Scripture, or in the early Fathers, as most of the 
peculiar tenets of the R-omish church, must certainly be con- 
cluded to be not necessary. Thus, by consulting first the 
Holy Scriptures, and next the writers of the Primitive 
church, we shall make ourselves acquainted with the will of 
God : thus shall we discover the good way, and find that 
rest for our souls which will amply recompense our studies 
and inquiries." This is the way to be settled and grounded 
in the truth; and "when I think of these things," says 
Alexander Knox of unstable views of men, " how I rejoice in 
my settledness." 

Speaking of sects in religion, in another Sermon,! he ob- 
serves with acute discernment, " He whose opinions are 

* Vol. i. Serm. vii. p. 154, &c. 
t Sermon xi. vol. i. p. 226. 



396 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

censured, feels the reputation of his understanding impaired ; 
he, whose party is opposed, finds his influence resisted, and 
perhaps his power, or his profit, in danger of diminution." 
This is said of the proud sectarian ; but he goes on to 
remark, " That men of different opinions should live at peace, 
is the true effect of that humility, which makes each esteem 
others better than himself, and of that moderation, which 
reason approves, and charity commands." He then counsels 
Christians, in the words of his text, to he all of one mind, 
and certainly unity must be looked to as the grand preserva- 
tive of the Christian religion. " My regard for unity," said 
the intellectual and saint-like Fletcher of Madeley, at a time 
when he was thought to be in the last stage of a consumption, 
" recovers my drooping spirits, and adds new strength to my 
wasted body ; I stop at the brink of the grave, over which T 
bend, and, as the blood oozing from my decayed lungs does 
not permit me vocally to address my contending brethren, by 
means of my pen I will ask them, if they can properly 
receive the Holy Communion while they ivillfullij remain in 
disunion with their brethren, from whom controversy has 
needlessly parted them ?"* And the celebrated Adam Clarke 
enjoyed a uniting spirit,! though he was not in union with 
the church, the res angusta domi having alone prevented his 
being brought up as a clergyman of the Church of England. 
" Of the Established Church," he writes, | " I have never 
been a secret enemy, nor a silent friend. What I feel 
toward it, the ■ingels are welcome to ponder : and what I 

* Southey's Life of Wesley, vol. ii. p. 382. 

t The pious Bishop Shirley, than whom few men were in the way 
of greater experience in the matter, while he states, that "the clergy 
of the Church of England are gaining year by year in spirituality, 
devotedness, and power;" bears this melancholy testimony; "The 
Dissenters are shrinking into rancorous sectarian agitators." It is 
probable, that some value politics more than religion, and would 
" Pour the sweet milk of concord into Hell, 
Uproar the universal peace, confound 
All unity on carthV 
But to such let Dr. Adam Clarke's censure on political preaching be 
strongly recommended. 

X See his admirable letter to the Bishop of London, in his own 
Memoirs. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 397 

have spoken or written concerning it, and in its favor, I 
believe I shall never be even tempted to retract. Being 
bred up in its bosom, I early drank in its salutary doctrines 
and spirit;" and he proceeds to say as much in deep regard 
for " Mother Church," as he terms it, as Dr. Johnson him- 
self could have expressed in his hours of most cordial attach- 
ment and warmth. And as Adam Clarke held kindly feel- 
ings toward the church, so Dr. Johnson was not unfrequently 
liberally inclined toward those who differed from him. When 
visiting an aged and venerable Presbyterian minister (Mac- 
lean) in Scotland, he records, " I lost some of his good- will, 
by treating a heretical writer with more regard than, in his 
opinion, a heretic could deserve :" and he adds of Mr. 
Maclean himself, " I honored his orthodoxy, and did not 
much censure his asperity." The heresy must have been on 
some point on which Churchman and Presbyterian were 
agreed. The Church of England can well afford to be 
generous : she is founded on a rock from whence she can, 
with every advantage to herself, extend a hand of sympathy 
and help to the weaker and less discreet. " JVc do not 
render evil for eviir observes the Rev. Mr. Agutter,* who 
preached a funeral sermon in the University of Oxford, on 
the death of Dr. Johnson, " we grant the Romanist a tolera- 
tion, which, if they had the supremacy they would not grant 
to us. We do not remember and repay the violence and the 
oppression which the Church of England was once made to 
suffer, when the Dissentei's had the upper hand." But, 
after all, Johnson's religion was not a religion of hostility to 
Romanism or Dissent, so much as it was a religion that 
craved after a good life, and sought the salvation of the soul 
through the faith that is in Christ Jesus. What he says of 
Dr. Sydenham, might have been written of himself, and far 
more : namely, that "his chief view was the benefit of man- 
kind, and the chief motive of all his actions the will of God, 
whom he mentions with reverence, well becoming the most 
enlightened and penetrating mind I 

We can least support Dr. Johnson in his fear of death, oi 
rather of eternity. The fear of death is implanted in tht 
* Sermons on Various Occasions, by Rev. William Agutter. p. 240. 



398 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

nature of man for sufficient reasons, but it is to be overcome 
by the Christian, and we dare not lower the standard of 
Christian joy and peace. Men commonly do not like to 
think of death, neither do they desire to be told of its pre- 
paratory warnings and weaknesses. When Gil Bias had 
obtained the situation of private secretary, &c. to the Arch- 
bishop of Grenada, and by his admiration of his patron's 
sermons and discourses had become his factotum, the Arch- 
bishop desired him to let him know when he perceived his 
Grace to fall off in his energetic addresses. The archbishop 
has an apoplectic attack from which he partially recovers so 
as to be able to preach, but preaches very indifferently. Gil 
Bias, according to order, ventures to take an opportunity of 
mentioning to his Grace that he perceived a diminution of 
strength and vigor in his discourses. The archbishop re- 
ceives the intimation quietly, but sends Gil Bias to his 
treasurer to receive a hundred ducats, and thus dismisses 
him, " Adieu, Mr. Gil Bias, I wish you all possible prosperity 
with a little more good taste.'"* 

Dr. Johnson's fear of death might arise from either of two 
causes, or from both combined — a constitutional tempera- 
ment, in which he is the object of pity rather than of ad- 
miration — all his lifetime subject to bondage through this 
fear of death — or else a deficiency of faith in the goodness 
and mercy of God in Christ Jesus. The latter view we 
may presume is much established by the fact that, as his end 
drew near, and his faith was strengthened, he seems to have 
viewed it with far less dread : and we may think, too, it is 
naturally enough inferred from the way in which he spoke 
of the " work of righteousness," as if it were more the result 
of his own efforts than of the gift of God. We can not help 
supposing that a more correct and lively apprehension of 
Ephes. ii. 8, would have been the true and effectual remedy 
for all his fears. Lei us, in all tenderness, consider it as a 
weakness to be pitied, and not an imitable excellence. Un- 
doubtedly it would not affect his salvation. Charles Simeon, 

* " Je vous souhaite toutes sortes de prosperite avec un peu plus 
de gout." — Gil Bias, voL iii. 12mo. edition. 



TllS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 393 

in writing of a person who had made use of some very hope- 
tal terms in her last hom's, says,* " I lay no stress on those 
expressions of hope which I have been speaking of, as though 
they ivere necessary to her salvation;'^ yet he hailed them 
with joy as coming from one exceedingly diffident of her 
state. And of himself he said, in an admirable letter to the 
Bishop of Calcutta, " I long to be in my proper place, my 
hand on my mouth, and my mouth in the dust. I would 
rather have my seed-time here, and wait for my harvest until 
I myself am carried to the granary of heaven. I feel this to 
be safe ground. Here I can not err."t And of the doctrine 
of assurance, Wesley said,t " Some are fond of this expres- 
sion : I am not : I hardly ever use it I believe a few, 

but very few. Christians have an assurance from God of ever- 
lasting salvation ; and this is the thing which the Apostle 
terms the ' plerophory,' or full assurance of hope." The pro- 
found and philosophical Cudworth, in a sermon on John ii. 
3,§ says, " The best assurance that any one can have of his 
interest in God is the conformity of his soul to God :" and, 
in like manner, Dr. Hampden (Bishop of Hereford) says, 
" The reality of the Divine presence by the Spirit with the 
believer, must not be confounded with the gross imaginations 
of the heart of man. Their feeling of joy is the result of 
conduct, harmonizing with their belief, and strengthening 
their belief by its accordance. It is not the work of a mo- 
ment — but of days — of years. "|| This is the true ground 
of assurance, but even this Dr. Johnson had not vividly and 
continually. Therefore was his happiness impaired. Let 
us not be accessory to an impression, that a loio state of love, 
and joy, and peace, is intended to be the Christian's position 
upon earth. Undoubtedly it often is so. But whenever it 
is, is it not usually (except in constitutionally exempt cases) re- 
solvable into want of faith, or inconsistency of conduct ? Of 
this we may be confident, as we can be of any thing we 

* Simeon's Memoirs, 3cl edition, p. 181. t Page 489. 

\ Southey's Life of Wesley, vol. ii. p. 182. 

§ The doctrine of Assurance, by the way, is untenable by this text, 
which is often adduced in its favor ; it has nothing to do with it. 
II Parochial Sermons. By Rev. Renn D. Hampden, p. 112. 



400 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

know, that, making every allowance for all sorts and kinds 
of depression, the state of feeling which is both commanded 
to every Christian, and promised also, and uniformly repre- 
sented as attainable, and as actually attained by many, is 
one far more happy than can be consistent with Dr. John- 
son's fears. It is evident that he did not rejoice in the Lord 
alway — that he did not walk through the valley of the 
shadow of death without fearing evil — that the presence of 
the Holy Spirit in his character of Comforter was not greatly 
vouchsafed to him ; and, in all sincerity, we must not hold 
up this state of mind as an example, but rather as a warning 
to others. We must not be dazzled by his superior talents 
and moral excellency so as to suppose that this defect is nec- 
essary or imitable. Probably if he could noio express his own 
altered sentiments, he would at once denounce himself as one 
" of little faith," who never needed to have had this cause to 
" doubt," but was led to do so by disproportionate attention to 
the obligations of man, as compared with the goodness, and 
sufficiency, and imparted power of the all-sufficient Saviour. 
Still let no man presume, let no man censure Dr. John- 
son, for great light was within him, and his love to his fel- 
low-creatures certainly sprang out of his love to God. Let 
not the multitude who have feelings of assurance, sudden as 
they are groundless, lift up their heads and imagine them- 
selves to be something when they are nothing. " The valet," 
says Carlyle, "does not know a hero when he sees him." 
Doctor Johnson was entitled to far greater degrees of happy 
feeling than he actually possessed, or his humility and sense 
of un worthiness would permit him to express. " A noble 
unconsciousness is in him. He does not engrave Truth on 
his watch seal : no, but he stands by truth, speaks by it, works 
and lives by it."* See him in the Church of St. Clement 
Danes, t pronouncing " with tremulous earnestness," the 
awfnl petition in the Liturgy : "In the hour of death, and at 
the day of judgment, good Lord, deliver us I" and all through 

* Cai-lyle's Heroes and Hero Worship, p. 289. 

f " That church of St. Clement Danes," observes Carlyle, p. 283, 
" where Johnson still worshiped in the era of Voltaire, is to me a 
venerable place.'''' 



i 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 401 

life endeavoring to attain the reality of religion ; and attain- 
ing it too, though not in all its freedom and joy. Yet was 
this great mournful Johnson a right valiant man.*" He 
sought virtue, and without virtue there is not evidence of a 
sincere faith. " Be good, be virtuous, my lord, you must 
come to this ;" were among the last words of the converted 
Lord Lyttelton to Lord Valentia. " We must all come to 
this," was ever Johnson's reflection on witnessing a death- 
bed, or hearing of death, and it was the voice that went forth 
from his own dying hour. Yet full as he was of good works, 
he did not say with Bishop Pearce (it may be harmlessly 
enough), on being asked one day how he could live with so 
little nutriment, " I live," said the bishop, " upon the recol- 
lection of an innocent and well spent life, which is my only 
sustenance. "t Let not this be despised, for doubtless the 
bishop reviewed his past life in the spirit of the twelfth and 
thirteenth articles of the Church of England. In such a 
spirit spake the pious George Herbert on his death-bed, when, 
to Mr. Woodnot, who took occasion to remind him of his 
rebuilding Layton church, and his many acts of mercy, he 
made answer, saying, " They be good works if they be 
sprinkled with the blood of Christ, and not otherwise." And 
Wesley's rebuke was just, as in the following anecdote. $ 
For, we are told, that Dr. Hales, Rector of Killesandra in 
Ireland, happening to tell Mr. Wesley, that when Bishop 
Chevenix (of Waterford) in his old age was congratulated on 
recovering from a fever, the bishop replied, " I believe I am 
not long for this world. I have lost all relish for what for- 
merly gave me pleasure ; even my books no longer entertain 
me. There is nothing sticks by me but the recollection of 
what little good I may have done." One of Mr. Wesley's 
preachers, who was present, exclaimed at this, " Oh, the vain 
man, boasting of his good works I" Dr. Hales vindicated the 
good old bishop, and Mr. Wesley silenced the preacher by 
saying, " Yes, Dr. Hales is right, there is indeed great com- 
fort in the calm remembrance of a life well spent." We 
are always reminded that an evil action will haunt the 

* Carlyle, p. 289. t Life of Mr. Bowyer, p. 431. 

i See vol. ii. of Southey's Life of Wesley. 



402 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSOxN'S LIFE. 

death-bed of the sinner ; and why should good actions, in all 
humility and in all subservience to the free mercy of God, be 
utterly cast out of remembrance at that awful season ? To 
any disposed to cavil on this subject, or inconsiderately to 
raise differences ore rotundo, let us say in the words of our 
greatest dramatist,* 

" Noble friends, 

That which combined us was most gi-eat, and let not 

A leaner action rend us. What's amiss, 

May it be gently heard : when we debate 

Our trivial difference loud, we do commit 

Murder in healing wounds." 

Great calmness in death has been the blessed privilege of 
an innumerable multitude of the members of the Church of 
England.! Some have been put in remembrance of a good 

* Shakspeare. 

t Read " Sacred Memorials of the Last Days and Blessed Deaths of 
Eminent Christians," &c. By the Rev. Henry Clissold, A.M. (Riving- 
tons). This book can not be too highly spoken of: it is the book of all 
modern books of a sacred character, that should be placed in the hands 
of every member of the Church of England, as a guide, counselor, 
comforter, and friend. The author's pious object, with the blessing of 
God, in compiling this book, must surely be successful— namely, 1st, 
For the use of the thoughtless, who, he hoped, as Addison did, might be 
deeply affected, and persuaded by such sights, when unmoved by ab- 
stract reasoning. 2dly, For the timid and desponding Christian, whose 
faith might be strengthened in learning how wonderfully others have 
been supported by the Holy Spirit in similar trials. 3dly, For the sick, 
who in these narratives might find much food lor religious reflection, 
and many states of mind worth aiming at in the chamber of sickness. 

The following letter is from the late Bishop Burgess, and addressed 
to a friend of the late Dr. Gaskin, Secretary to the Society for the 
Promotion of Christian Knowledge : 

" Dear Sir — Your account of the death of Dr. Gaskin shall be tran- 
scribed into one of the blank pages of Clissold's Last Hours of Eminent 
Christians, a most interesting work to a plusque-septuagenary, which 
has been, for some time, a part of our evening reading. It is a most 
valuable collection of practical divinity, taught and enforced by lessons 
of unaffected, undisguised, unequivocal instruction. 

" Yours most sincerely, 

"T. Saeum." 

As often as we read this book, we may we'll praise and thank God 
for the grace it hath pleased Him to bestow on members of the Church 
of England ; and let us hope, that the pages of this book will be largely 
replenished. 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 403 

life past ; others, which is better, have not made mention of 
the actions that adorned their useful career. The Rev. Dr. 
Aylmer w^as a pattern. <•' Let my people know," he said, "that 
their pastor died undaunted, and not afraid of death. I bless 
my God that I have no fear, no doubt, no reluctation, but 
an assured confidence in the sin-overcoming merits of Jesus 
Christ." And in the conclusion of all, he shut his otvn ei/cs 
u'ith his own hands, dying in the Lord Jesus. " I long for 
death," exclaimed the Rev. Thomas Cole (1697), as a weary 
traveler doth for his rest ; nothing troubles me but life, and 
nothing will relieve me but death : but let God do with me 
what He will : all He does is best ;" and, after expressing full 
trust in his Redeemer, he concluded, " I long to be immortal : 
it is a mean thing to live a dying life." 

Most edifying was the death-bed of Bishop Bull. " Doctor," 
he said to his physician, " you need not be afraid to tell me 
freely what your opinion of me is : for I thank my good God, 
I am not afraid to die ; it is what I have expected long ago, 
and I hope I am not unprepared for it now." He disclaim- 
ed all notion of inherent righteousness, but put the matter 
clearly, in a few words, " I believe that while I bring forth 
fruits worthy of faith and repentance, and while I not only 
abstain from those crimes which, according to the Gospel, ex- 
clude a man from heaven, but do diligently, likewise, exercise 
myself in good works, both those of piety toward God, and 
those of charity toward my neighbor, so long I may preserve 
the grace that is given me of remission and justification ; and 
that, if I die in this state, I am in the tvay of obtaini7ig 
it, by the tnercy of God, and eternal life and salvation for 
the sake of Jesus Christ." 

Yes, it is to the mercy of God that every man must look 
in a dying hour. We are told of Bishop Wilson, that " all 
his cry was for mercy :" of him, who like a full ear of corn, 
was bended down with his good works : of him who was an 
" epistle known and read of all men." (2 Cor. iii. 2.) And 
we are told * of a minister of eminent piety and distinguished 
usefulness, who, on being told on his death-bed by his sm*- 
rounding friends, that he was going to receive his reward, 
* Stowell's Life of Bishop Wilson, p. 254. 



404 CLOSE OF DR. JOHNSON'S LIFE. 

answered, " I am going to receive mercy .'' Dr. Johnson, on 
hearing of a criminal's prayer for mercy, said in a solemn, 
fervid tone, " I hope he shall find mercy." And let us hope 
that Dr. Johnson himself, the learned, the great, and the re- 
ligious, has found that mercy with God which he desired so 
earnestly for an unfortunate fellow-creature. Surely, when 
we contemplate his last hours, we are not mistaken in put- 
ting into his mouth the lines of Sir Henry Wotton : 

" Now have I done ; now are rny thoughts at peace ; 
And now my joys are stronger than my grief; 
I feel those comforts that shall never cease, 
Future in hope, but present in belief. 
Thy words are true, Thy promises are just, 
And Thou wilt find Thy dearly bought — in dust." 

And now, gentle reader, we must come to a close. Adam 
Clarke, in speaking of a small town in the Land's End in 
Cornwall, tells us, that on the sign of an inn, as you come 
from the Land's End, are these words — " The first Inn in 
England ;" and on the reverse are the following — " The last 
Inn in England." Reader I you will soon have come from 
first to last in this my book, wherein I trust you have not 
been wearily detained ; at all events, let me hope that your 
duty hath pardoned any want of entertainment in my efibrts ; 
for, as has been said,* " Personal gratitude, and personal 
affection to the good and great Avho have closed their scene 
upon earth, are elevated sentiments. They are debts of 
honor to the departed spirit." But, reader, you will soon 
have passed from first to last in your mortal career : and 
while you derive, throughout your course on earth, much in- 
struction from Dr. Johnson's life and writings, may you have 
a fair hope of the mercy of God in your entrance upon eter- 
nity ! 

Let me conclude with Dr. Johnson's own words. " There 
are few things," he writes in the last number of his Idler,! 
<' not purely evil, of which we can say, without some emotion 
of uneasiness, this is the last. Those who never could agree 
together, shed tears when mutual discontent has determined 
them to final separation : of a place which has been frequent- 
ly^ George Hardinge t Vol. ii. p. 28 L 



HIS CALMNESS IN DEATH. 405 

ly visited, though without pleasure, the last look is taken with 
heaviness of heart .... The ternmination of any period of life 
reminds us that life itself has likewise its termination : when 
we have done any thing for tlie last time, we involuntarily 
reflect that a part of the days allotted us is past, and that as 
more is past there is less remaining." 

So is it with the author in writing a book — so is it with 
the reader in reading it I And to all men there is a time 
when it must be said — then cometh the end. 



THE END. 



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